


Excerpts From Celtic Texts

by Drakey



Category: Sid Meier's Civiliation IV
Genre: Alternate History, Let's Play
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2018-07-14
Packaged: 2019-02-16 08:13:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 38
Words: 35,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13050060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drakey/pseuds/Drakey
Summary: I just started a new game of Civilization IV. I'm using the Rise Of Mankind: A New Dawn mod, playing as the Celtic Empire with unrestricted leaders. This is just me documenting my wars through hypothetical textbook entries, historical texts, and other in-universe things.





	1. Etymology In A Nutshell #291 "Carthagicy"

Today is Setsday, and that, dear readers, means it's time for an etymology lesson. We'll be examining the Gaelic language family's most unusual-and unusually storied-loan word. "Carthagicy" is now defined as "a willingness to start a fight that you have lost before," but this definition is a highly simplified one from the rich meaning the word originally had. The oldest mention of the word is from the year 951 in the Current Era, in a Bibractian letter from the High Priest of Amun to then-reigning king of Celtia, Shon-Xi III. Although the letter is in Classical Gaelic, the word itself appears almost unchanged from its modern spelling.

_Our gods teach us, Dear Sire, that the King is above all, and none but the King may rule His subjects. This is the common truth acknowledged by all religions in our lands, but Dear Sire, the Naghualist Priest from Vienne sits too secure behind his Great Wall. It leaves him arrogant, and although he cannot gain the support of his fellows in the country, he insists upon demanding greater power for his temple. I admire his persistent dedication to his faith and his gods, but Dear Sire, it is naught but Carthagitsy. It is dangerous, Dear Sire, and I beg You quash it before it threatens us all._

But why this sudden emergence of the word?

We all know of the Epoch of War, that grand and grinding conflict spanning nearly five hundred years of all but continuous war between Celtia and the Carthaginian peoples. It is the longest war of the Pre-Reform period, and so slowed the expansion of Celtia that it is said to have set the world back some two centuries. In the middle of this dragging war emerges this word, which refers to zealotry and a vicious willingness to kill in support of one's faith. Carthagicy is noble but misguided, the mark of a competent fighter who can hold his own, but ultimately will know only defeat. But why?

The Epoch of War is of course closely tied with this word, but also closely tied is the strange respect Celts have for Carthaginians. Even now, stereotypes and idioms declare that great soldiers and powerful generals come from Carthage, and that no army could ever take Carthage without killing everyone in the city who could lift a weapon to defend it. Gilford Vane, famous boxer and native son of York, is called "The Carthaginian" because he simply cannot be knocked down. What is interesting is that this connotation attaches to a city most famous for its fall to the armies of Celtia.

Let us then examine the events of the Epoch of War. Sometime around the year 600 CE, Joan I of Carthage reported that a Christian priest visiting from Utica had blessed her, and that in the night, she received a vision from the Christian God. A few short years later, the Carthaginian Queendom was entirely a Christian nation, and at the time, Celtia officially followed the Kemetism so prominent in the capital city of Bibracte. In need of a way to bolster popular support for the new state religion, Joan's advisors pushed her to declare war against the "heathens to the South." Surely they pictured a vast Carthaginian army sweeping the continent clean and bringing them all greater power.

What the Carthaginian advisors didn't know was that Celtia had its own designs on Carthage. Gergovia played host to nearly ten thousand elite Gallic warriors, half the army King Shain intended to build by the time of his death. They were effectively a military city outside of the existing city, whole sections of the Celtic population uprooted and living, working, and training to be the army of Celtia. When Joan I's declaration of war reached Bibracte with an army on its heels, all ten thousand warriors set out at once for the Carthaginian city of Hadrumetum. The unexpected force smashed through the army Joan had sent for Gergovia, overran the defenses of Hadrumetum, and left a garrison of some fifteen hundred men at the city while the rest broke north for Utica.

It is an old adage that no plan survives contact with the enemy, but the plans of Carthage had gone disastrously wrong almost at once. The unexpected hammerblow of the Gallic warriors from the West forced Joan to attempt to retake Hadrumetum or lose the support of her people at once. The peculiar strengths of Gallic training and weapons, however, prevented this. Hadrumetum was on a hill, and Gallic warriors were uniquely suited to fighting in the hills. An entire army smashed itself helplessly against the walls of a city that was once home to many of them, and the Carthaginian war machine ground to a halt even as the Celtic charge was stopped at Utica. With the death of Joan I, Carthage sued for peace, and the first war ended in a Carthaginian defeat. Joan II, less fanatical and more patient, built up her armies while King Shain of Celtia wasted away in his palace.

The exchange of one city into Celtic hands seemed not so unusual, and King Shon-Xi I came to power without issue. He ordered a time of rebuilding and development, but the death at fifty years of Joan II led to an abrupt change of plans. Again Carthage declared war. Joan III, obsessed with her grandmother's vision, attacked before she was ready, and a vast Christian army roamed piecemeal and marauding into Celtic territory. Reforms and efforts at reorganization allowed Celtia to raise a new army quickly, though that army was not very experienced. They were, however, well-equipped, and chased the Carthaginian army away from Bibracte while more elite and well-trained soldiers again marched on Utica, bringing a run of catapults stolen from Carthage with them.

Thus began the Epoch.

The first war with Carthage was seen nearly as a joke by most Celts. The foolish Carthaginians had attacked without learning where their enemies would be, and had lost because of it. Now, though, Carthage was again on the move, and how terrible a threat they were. Shon-Xi I, seeing the power of the encroaching Carthaginian armies, had correctly deduced that Joan III, though disorganized and probably mad, commanded enough power to smash his defenses and take Bibracte, Tolosa, and Gergovia if he did not act with great care. The forced conscription of thousands of macemen left a profound impact on people who had been spared the horrors of barbarian raids by the Great Wall that wrapped around Vienne in the South clear to Bibracte in the North. For the first time, the Celtic people were frightened, not of domestic terrors and disease, but of war. Armies had clashed in desperate combat within sight of the walls of Bibracte. Carthage had already lost this war once. What madness compelled them to fight it again?

The siege of Bibracte was broken by overwhelming numbers chasing the Carthaginian army away from the South and West, but it left a lasting impression on Celtic minds, and the news of the siege of Utica was no more encouraging. Soldiers grew old on the fields to the South and West of the Carthaginian city, and multiple sallies beat down the shanty-town around the siege engines. 

Utica fell only in the year 838 CE. Again, Carthage sued for peace, after generations of war. The Celtic kings had pleaded with Germany and England to declare war on Carthage, and had met with success after their own victories proved it was not so foolish a notion, but both Germany and England were too far away to lend more than naval support. Celtia purchased four runs of catapults from Germany after the German war effort was dropped, and after a brief resting period, Shon-Xi III declared war again in solidarity with the English.

The siege of Carthage should have been brief, but it lasted for three hundred years. "The War" became an industry unto itself. Celtia existed only to break Carthage, and Carthage existed only to survive Celtia. Seven cities, focused wholly on breaking one, were cowed by the might of the generals of Carthage, and although they could keep the enemy contained within their own territory, Carthaginian armies again and again broke the siege. Catapults were destroyed. The Lake of Carthage served to ferry soldiers around behind invading armies. Reinforcements arrived to find that Carthage had brought farmers from the countryside and armed them with longbows again and again and again. It was only in 1173, when Shon-Xi VI ascended to the Celtic throne, that things changed.

In the end, Carthage was taken because the Celts surrounded it, burned farms and mines and destroyed roads, ruined the countryside, and gathered in numbers that drowned the Carthaginians. It is estimated that nearly a million macemen died to soften the defenses of Carthage in the final charge in 1190, and when Carthage fell, Shon-Xi VI gave a great speech commending the vanquished enemy and welcoming them to the Celtic empire. 

Carthage is a respected city for their proud resistance in the war. And the word that Carthage became means a proud willingness to start a fight you have already lost.

Carthagicy: Noun. A proud and zealous willingness to fight a lost cause for one's beliefs.


	2. Excerpt From "Where Did Arabia Go" by Mohammed Fitz

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gilgamesh really disappointed me. Only one of his cities lasted more than one turn.

The city of Camulodunum sits in the center of the Celtic Continent's East Reach, and is well respected now, but there was a time when it was little more than a jumping-off point for Celtic conquest. This brief time, from 1438 to 1470, marks the end of several things. First, it is the last gasp of warfare fought with the sword and bow. Second, it is the beginning of the fall of the Arabian Republic. 

In 1319, the Free Church Experiment was officially ended when Asatru priests from Tolosa abstained from the vote to place the German leadership in the Palace of Odin and discovered that Celtic influence over the Asatru religion was so negligible as to be nonexistent. The German residency in the Palace frightened the Asatru community in Celtia, and a sweeping reform was made by the simple expediency of a coup. 

Shon-Xi XI was killed in his palace in Bibracte by an angry mob of religious extremists, and replaced by Aine Bersavat, an Odin-worshipping daughter of a line of bastard children descended from King Shain. Aine's husband, Geoffrey Bersavat, was High Priest of Odin in Celtia, and quickly declared Asatru the official state religion of Celtia, even as he girded the nation for war. His rule was by no means solid, granted only a veneer of legitimacy by his wife's royal bloodline and technical place on the throne. The Church began to train Gothi in great numbers in Tolosa, and it was only through this effort that the cities of Celtia became so steeped in the previously-minor religion.

At the same time as Asatru was being spread through the nation, a strong rhetoric of hatred was established by the Church. The English, to the South, were too powerful and dangerous to be provoked, and while their state religion was not Asatru, they had never tried to impose their faith on others. Germany was completely invalid as a target because they were the origin of Asatru. This left only Arabia, and Geoffrey Bersavat instructed his missionaries to stress the religious origins of the war with Carthage some hundred years previously. Arabia was the last Christian nation in the world, and Christianity was clearly dangerous.

While Geoffrey Bersavat stirred up the nation against Arabia, Queen Aine turned her attention to the military. Most of the army was trained only in the use of swords, and the longbow was still the prevailing instrument of the defenders of the nation. Tolosa, ever a center of innovation and power, drew her attention in 1341 when Bryce Shuul demonstrated a device with which he could kill a stag from the city's wall. The weapon, which the blacksmith called a "personal bombard," was small enough to be carried by a soldier, and Queen Aine immediately ordered them produced in great numbers and sent along with men trained in their use to every city in the Queendom. At the same time, a huge number of the new weapons were sent to Camulodunum, where they were to be stockpiled.

By the time Queen Aine died in 1388, having outlived her husband by some twelve years, she had direct control over the military, and she passed this on to her daughter, Aine II, who she had instructed to "learn the entirety of war." Aine II built up the army in Camulodunum, sent swordsmen and macemen in droves to the city, and in 1438, activated the first Army of Gunners on Celtic soil. She was succeeded in 1460 by her daughter, Aine III, who declared open war on Arabia to the great eagerness of the Celtic peoples. A contingent of some five thousand light swordsmen immediately swarmed the meager defenses of Kufah, to the West of Camulodunum, but a force of more than fifteen thousand soldiers had set out. That which swarmed the palisade at Kufah was merely a detachment.

In 1477, word reached Bibracte, within days of each other, of the taking of both Damascus and Baghdad, Damascus by a great effort on the part of five thousand heavy swordsmen, Baghdad having fallen swiftly and precipitously in the face of a mere four thousand macemen. 

In 1484, the Age of the Sword ended.

Mecca was defended by two thousand bowmen. The surprise of the Celtic army upon seeing that the defenders of their enemy's capital weren't even armed with true longbows led them to call for the city's surrender without firing a shot. Their messengers were shot full of arrows and left to die on the ground. The charge that followed is recorded as the first true act of gunpowder warfare. Eight thousand men set up matchlocks in ranks, fired, and advanced, steadily grinding down the palisade around Mecca.

Gilgamesh, Chancellor of Arabia, fled the city by sea, escaping the rout of his defenders and running to Medina, from whence he sent out a plea to spare his cities if he agreed to become the servant of Celtia in all things. 

Aine III ignored his plea and sent a force to Medina. Gilgamesh fled there as well.

Meanwhile, to the South, a detachment of swordsmen, some four thousand men, assaulted the city of Najram and were barely repelled by the archers there. A siege began in 1499, a year before the successful assault on Medina. 

The Celtic Army of Gunners swung East around the Mountains of Basra and split into two contingents, three thousand heading towards Basra in the far West while a thousand broke off to take Najram. Gilgamesh was reported to have fled Medina for Basra, but he never reached the city. En route, he was killed by his advisors, and this is ultimately what ended the Arabian people's hopes. Aine III understood that either all of Arabia must be conquered or its ruler must be put in chains. After the disaster that had been the war with Carthage, to leave an enemy able to strike at Celtia was unthinkable. The new Arabian leadership hung Gilgamesh from the walls of Basra, but by the time the Celtic soldiers arrived, he was too decayed to be identified. The taking of Najram to the East some seven months before provoked a great confidence in the Celtic army, and a charge of heavy swordsmen softened the feeble Arabian defenses for the Celtic Gunners.

Gilgamesh was not found, and the conclusion was that he had fled to the nearby independent city of Shangi. The Shangian people had no love of Arabia, but were accused of hiding Gilgamesh and overrun by three thousand Celtic Gunners in 1520. 

The Celtic Continent trembled at the momentous events they had just witnessed. War had never been conducted this way before. An unprepared country was a country that wouldn't last.

The Age of the Sword was over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The dates aren't totally accurate. It was a very quick war for this part of the game, but I've probably compressed time some.


	3. Piotr Mirska National Museum, Najran, Informative Plaques P1-P12

Plaque 1

Piotr Mirska was born in Moscow in 1700, thirty years after Russia's Jaoa II petitioned Celtia for protection and favor. The new colonies on the Russian continent were struggling, but as a great place of opportunity, were still experiencing massive emigration from Russia and the Khmer Kingdom, their neighbors on the continent. The Mirska family left Moscow in a caravan like the one depicted here. Piotr Mirska's impression of the journey is recorded in his diary, which resides in Independence Hall.

Plaque 2

This diorama is a recreation of the square in Durnovaria in 1712, the year the Mirska family arrived. The smallest house is where the family of ten resided. The original residence was destroyed in the riot of 1848 by Khmer arsonists. While residing in Durnovaria, Piotr Mirska observed that the Celtic cities on the Russian continent were no more prosperous or advanced than their Russian counterparts, and was shocked to learn, during a trade expedition to Angkor Wat in 1714 and 1715, that the technologically backward Khmer lived in luxury compared to his own adopted countrymen.

Plaque 3

This map shows the faces and names of the Mirska Thirty beside the cities they resided in. Of particular interest is Brian Vulfersson, who was the lead architect for the Palace of Verlamion. The blueprint of the palace, which were meant to be secret, were given to Piotr Mirska in a personal meeting in 1718, three years before the Palace was completed. Without this famous act of patriotism, Piotr Mirska might be forgotten as a minor politician, and Celtia might still languish under the monarchy's absolute authority.

Plaque 4

This model of the Carthaginian Flyer shows the Fluyt's condition before it was pressed into military service in 1850. In 1720, it took Piotr Mirska to the growing military port in Medina. Its arrival on Ainuary 3rd, 1721 is celebrated as a holiday across the city. It was placed in a historic berth in Isca in 1831, nearly burned by Khmer rioters in 1848, and used to ferry the Isca Brigade to Rajavihara in 1850. It weathered an assault by three Khmer sloops and delivered the reinforcements, but was sunk during the attempt to return to Isca.

Plaque 5

Piotr Mirska journeyed first to Baghdad, where the head priest of the Asatru Festhall in the city listened to his pleas for Church aid to the colonies. Although his pleas were answered with significant official aid, the ultimate impact of the donations was negligible, and did nothing to improve Colonial infrastructure.

Plaque 6

Independence Hall was originally built as the Najran City Hall and served as Piotr Mirska's offices when he was elected mayor of Najran in 1735. He first entered it as a clerk at the age of 23, where he built a reputation as a helpful, thoughtful, and efficient worker. By 1725, he was serving as a judge, which lasted until his election to city council in 1729. His successful mayoral bid in 1735 marked the first ascension to mayor of any Russian national on the Celtic continent.

Plaque 7

Piotr Mirska is depicted here giving his famous Speech on the Colonies. Delivered on Shainuary 21, 1738, while the largest winter storm the region had seen in forty years poured rain on the Palace walls in Bibracte, the Speech on the Colonies left a lasting impact with religious leaders and stirred both German and English sympathies. Press the button below to hear an excerpt from the speech.

Plaque 8

Queen Bronwen IV chose Piotr Mirska to accompany her to the Palace of Verlamion as a native guide to the Colonies. Upon the Palace's completion in 1740, the queen brought Mirska with her on the Ship of the Line _Basra._ Mirska, seeing his chance, arranged for the Mirska Thirty to make their move, contacting his friends in the Colonies and provoking a riot outside the Palace.

Once the riot was in full swing, Piotr offered to address the citizens and resolve the matter peacefully, persuading Bronwen IV to remain in the Palace and "avoid provoking open rebellion." Mirska himself, meanwhile, left the palace, claiming that his status as a native of the Russian Continent would protect him. Messengers sent by Brian Vulfersson claimed during the early months of 1741 that Mirska was in Durnovaria, negotiating with citizens' groups and attempting to disperse the rioters.

Plaque 9

Piotr Mirska gave the blueprints for the Palace of Verlamion to an elite group of rebels before leaving for Baghdad. At the end of 1741, when Bronwen IV attempted to escape the Palace, she was captured and kept in the Palace by force without the military being made aware of her capture. Without the Vulfersson Blueprints, the coup would have been impossible.

Plaque 10

Piotr Mirska moved his offices into the City Hall in Baghdad. From there, he coordinated the affairs of the kingdom and gradually reorganized the government as a federation, decentralizing power and proving the kingdom could be run without the queen.

Plaque 11

A secret meeting in 1745 in Independence Hall marked the final stage of Piotr Mirska's quiet revolution, and the Bronwen IV was taken in secret by loyal military officers to Baghdad. On Shonuary 18, 1747, Bronwen IV was placed under guard in the Mayoral Estate in Baghdad, and Piotr Mirska ordered the construction of the Baghdad Palace to house the monarch.

Plaque 12

Piotr Mirska is shown here giving his speech from the steps of Baghdad City Hall, declaring Baghdad the new capital and announcing the formal independence of Celtia from the monarchy. Although the Royal Family retains a largely-ceremonial position of authority, the decentralized government was much more capable of competing on the world stage, and is partially credited with subsequent Celtic successes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a complicated session, and I'm going to do two more parts to explain it, one about my contact with the cultures of the largest continent, and one about the war I fought at the end of it.
> 
> I built the Indepence Hall wonder toward the middle of the session and gained access to all of the Rule civics, so I immediately switched to my favorite, Federation, which drops my maintenance costs quite a bit.
> 
> The war at the end of the session is pretty funny, so there'll be some notes about that.


	4. The Speech On The Colonies, Piotr Mirska, Shainuary 21, 1738, Old Palace, Bibracte

Let us reflect, Your Majesty, upon my own family's story. Sometime in my great grandfather's childhood, the first ships from Celtia discovered our tiny, backwards city. Until then, we had known only ourselves and the Khmer, only those who resembled us and were a part of our strange shared history. In my grandfather's youth, the first scouts from the Celtic colonies reached us, carrying muskets and sharing great wonders. We learned of the way the rest of the world calls the years. 

Verlamion, Durnovaria, Isca, and Nemetocenna became cities of nearly mythic wealth and power. Jaoa II agreed to become your vassal.

In my father's childhood, Durocorturum and Calleva were settled. My father dreamed of visiting the great cities of the Celts, so close by on our continent. He grew and married and I was born, and learned of the broad world. We learned of the wonders of Holy Rome to the North and the East, of the strange habits and powerful queens of Japan, the treacherous and powerful Americans, the empresses of Old Rome, the fugitive nation of True America. We were visited by envoys of China and Siam, and the Greeks began to build something they called an "embassy," which my father couldn't recall having ever heard of. The vastness and prosperity of the continent to our north astonished us, but it also terrified our people. 

Jaoa II petitioned you for protection against a multitude of potential enemies. The Celts promised to be the hammer of Thor, the strong and shielding arms of Heimdall, and my Father grew confident under Celtic protection. The belligerence of the Napoleanic Kings from distant Holy Rome, the posturing of the Line of Justinian from Siam, it did not frighten my father, and when he left Moscow with his family, with me, I looked forward to my arrival in Durnovaria with powerful anticipation.

I expected to live in untold luxury in a house facing the warm tropical seas. Imagine, Your Majesty, my disappointment to live in a shack so far from the ocean that I could not smell it. Imagine my despair when I discovered that not one of the great things the Celtic soldier who sometimes came to Moscow had mentioned was there. I heard tales of Bibracte and Baghdad all my life. Mecca and Damascus, Carthage and Tolosa, these were cities of legend! I longed to see walls like the Great Wall of Vienne, to visit temples like the legendary Shwedagon Paya in Tolosa and the Festhall of Camulodunum. I wanted to tour the Pyramids in Bibracte, and the Karnak Temple Complex beside them.

Durnovaria had one temple, one monastery, and one forge. There were five wells, and rampant disease, and little food, and only the lowest of walls, and all the news we received was of the other cities in our nation, on our continent, struggling as we did. It takes time to truly establish a city, but these had been for half a century or more and were little more than villages. I tell Your Majesty the truth, Moscow was larger and more luxurious than Durnovaria. 

Let us reflect upon travels with my father's trading company. I journeyed to Angkor Wat and found it the most fantastic place I had ever been. The roads Celtia's ceaseless efforts had carved through the jungles made a journey of years into one of a few months, and I was pleased beyond all measure to visit the Khmer, but when I returned to Durnovaria, I recalled the boasts and pridefulness of the Celtic soldiers. Bibracte and Medina, they said, were far greater cities than Yasodharapura and Khoisan, Kalakh and Rajavihara. Angkor Wat, it was said, was the grandest of the Khmer cities, and Angkor Wat was supposed to pale in comparison to the grandeur of the worst Celtic city.

Why, then, did I long to return to Angkor Wat?

When I first visited Durocorturum, I met a couple at the hotel, dressed in the clothing of nobles, who claimed they were taking in the queer solitude and great peace of the city, which was said to be like one with the forest around it, but I knew the truth. Durocorturum is even now fighting a losing battle with the jungle. Your majesty, there is a grave danger in the Colonies, and that danger is neglect. I beg you, develop the Colonies. Renovate the Palace of Verlamion. Make of the Colonies what your ancestors have made of Arabia, Carthage, and Celtia.

You would not now proudly walk the streets of Nemetocenna. Please, Your Majesty. Make the Colonies a place you would uphold as an example to the world. A country you could be proud of if you lost all else to the void. There is no other option save to lose the Colonies to their own decay.


	5. The Kalakh Letter, by Queen Chey III of Khmer, 1866, sent from Mecca Airfield to Celtia Informer, published nationwide.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, the last few hundred years were interesting. I built the Independence Hall wonder, which opened up all of the Rule civics. That let me switch to my favorite Rule civic, Federation. I used that to drop my maintenance costs and had to go through a pretty lengthy anarchy for it.
> 
> Before that, though, I was contacted by Napolean from the northernmost continent. It turns out I'm on the mid-sized of three continents, and while I was a decently big fish at the time, I wasn't yet the hyper-advanced threat to the security of all other nations I am by now (I just dropped my first nuke. China was not pleased). Napolean turned out to be a huge bag of dicks, and I did my damnedest to gain more territory in preparation for the possibility of war with him.
> 
> I teched up to ocean travel in a hurry and discovered that the only remaining accessible, un-colonized land was a huge swath of jungle on the smallest continent, and settled a bunch of cities there in a hurry, but they took forever to develop. 
> 
> For the curious, my list of rivals is:
> 
> On the largest, northern continent:  
> Kublai Khan-America  
> Mansa Musa-Native America  
> Napolean-Holy Rome  
> Wilhelmina-Rome  
> Dido-Japan  
> Afonso I-Greece  
> Justinian I-Siam  
> Getshwayo-China
> 
> On the second-largest, eastern continent:  
> Me-Celtia  
> Selassie-England  
> Asoka-Germany  
> Joan of Arc-Carthage-dead  
> Gilgamesh-Arabia-dead
> 
> On the smallest, western continent:  
> Victoria-Khmer  
> Jaoa III-Russia  
> Me again
> 
> Russia asked to become my vassal basically the instant we met, and that was... a little indicative of the way this game is going.

When I was very young, my mother's madness was already apparent, but she was the queen and we were subject to her whims. I have changed the law so that it can never happen again, but we will pay, I am sure, for her madness. For centuries, we will pay.

Know that I do not seek forgiveness. I fought to kill as many of your countrymen as I could. There is no forgiveness for my murders. I seek only to explain. It was not I who declared war. That was my mother, twenty years ago. She was foolish and proud, and I could not imagine what she would do in her vainglory. Her commitment to Confucianism was frightening, but it reached its terrible zenith when the ambassador's daughter married that factory worker in Baghdad.

I can recall looking out over the ocean in Yasodharapura on the day the news arrived. Your Prime Minister Barca had offended Ambassador Toch by lavishing absurd gifts upon the couple in the Asatru tradition. When the wedding was held in the Camulodunum Festhall itself, without the slightest mention of any Confucian tradition, Toch begged my mother to punish the arrogance of the Celts.

And the stupid hag did it.

As the trumpets rang out, I hoped my mother would die for dooming our people. A fleet of tiny boats gathered in the sea to strike angrily at your people if they approached, but while Mother's pathetic gang of triremes and sloops played soldier in the shallows, Celtia had been preparing to go to war, not with us, but with Holy Rome, an empire far beyond what we could hope to fight. That the Celts were preparing to fight the Holy Romans at all, that they would so much as think of it, was so astonishing and terrifying that it was like hearing of a clash between gods and realizing that you've just been forced to hit one of them on the nose.

The Celtic Navy is well known to be the most frightening in the world. Powerful Iron Frigates, swift steamers and a handful of dreadnoughts, and all of it was gathered at Medina with the older wooden ships of the line. Mother's folly came, and thirty thousand soldiers left Medina on their two-year journey past the bloated belly of America and Greece, a fleet that could have taken only a single city from the Napoleanic Kings, and that only with great difficulty, was instead coming towards us.

A hundred sunrises stained the sea below the Forbidden Palace in Yasodharapura before we learned of the fleet coming to deal our deaths. The advisors convinced mother to send an envoy to the fleet, but he was rebuffed, sent back with word of what the Celtic people would do to us.

And I could not protest it. The mingling of Celt and Khmer had begun in Nemetocenna and Isca, Angkor Wat and Rajavihara. Our people lived and worked in Celtia, and my mother stirred them up like a hornet's nest. It was at her command that the riots began in Durnovaria, Isca, Durocorturum, and Calleva. Thousands of Celtic lives were lost because my mother commanded her people to strike against the Celts for their "insult."

It was crass and cruel, religious violence and terrible, sinful, criminal behavior. You began to raise what army you could on the Russian continent, and they set out around the time the messengers came to us with news of our doom. Mother moved me to Angkor Wat, and she remained in Yasodharapura. I acted.

I am the murderer, first and foremost, of my mother. A few loyal men whipped her into religious fervor. They took advantage of the state wedding between a German ambassador and a Celtic mayor to try to convince her that the gods would crush the invaders if she was there to face them in person. When the cannons arrived, with the riflemen and elephants, we were terrified. The Celtic fleet broke through toy soldiers guarding our coast and deposited death onto our shores. A swarm of warriors armed with weapons that could have taken, perhaps, one city from their intended target.

That was the humiliation. The Khmer people were an afterthought compared to the war the Celtic Federation intended to wage. The day word reached us that my mother had been killed on the wall in Yasodharapura, I did as I had intended to do all along.

I gave up on everything south of Angkor Wat. I left them to deal with the terrifying new weapons of the invaders on their own. Grenades were thrown against the walls of Angkor Thom and Rajavihara, and Nagara Jayasri. I watched the maps, and then the plains below Angkor Wat's walls. I sent longbowmen. I had nothing else. It was enough, for a time. A few arquebus guns were produced while the hopelessly-outmatched defenders fought the battered attackers. 

Angkor Wat would have fallen months sooner if it had met fresh invaders, but the cannons and riflemen were forced to sit and rest beneath our walls. Once we had guns, we could hold our capital long enough for the next move.

I didn't try to keep Angkor Wat. I only made it a difficult target. The invaders could be held for a time there while I reinforced Hariharalaya. I gave up completely on Khoisan. Holding it would occupy some of the Celts, and it was too close to the Colonies to be saved. I heard when I arrived in Kalakh after fleeing from Angkor Wat that Khoisan had fallen to a column of elephant-riding riflemen, sheltered behind an armored saddle atop their mounts. 

You were not blameless. My people are scattered throughout Celtia. Each city, you stole the people who had been there. The core of what would have been a rebellion, you took from each city and placed too far apart to do anything to you. You laid terrible siege to Hariharalaya, and the battle there raged for months while I made myself strong in Kalakh.

I could only flee from your terrible westward advance, but I do not apologize for squeezing every drop of blood I could from your armies. It preserved my people. If there had been only a thousand more soldiers at the battlements of Kalakh, if I had failed to account for even one of the regiments my armies took in ambush and pitfall, Kalakh would have fallen. You cannot know how close you were. Another charge, a fresh unit, more grenades or rifles or elephants, and I would have swung from the city gate, but with all I could salvage of my army, I achieved my tiny victory.

I watched from the town watchtower as my arquebusiers attacked your cannons. If they had failed, I would have died.

I watched from the town watchtower as my horsemen halted your rifle and grenade charge across the river to the north and east. The horsemen were killed, every last one, but your armies could not gather the strength with what my armies had left them. They could have taken Kalakh, I am certain, but when I sent a messenger under a flag of surrender, your general was glad to accept my capitulation as he would not have been at any other city.

I surrendered unconditionally, and here I am. I live in what my people would call great luxury, but no Khmer monarch will ever return to Kalakh again. Mecca and Baghdad, Bibracte and Tolosa are my home now. The leaders of my people must all lead as hostages, but the people they will lead will be Khmer. 

I fought you until I convinced you the price of our destruction would be more blood than you were willing to pay, and I pass on this legacy to my daughters: that they shall have subjects, though they are far away. I tell them also of a mandate: Do not make war against the Celts. Do not make war for faith. Serve Celtia as you serve Kalakh, and always remember that the price of our pride was an empire.

Her Majesty and Holiness, Chey III, By Grace of the Gods Queen of Kalakh-In-Khmer, Servant of Celtia and Odin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the single most absurd war I've ever fought in Civ 4, and I enjoyed every second of it. I was building up for a (probably losing) war against Napolean, who disliked me and had several vassals, when I was able to deter him with a defensive pact with England and Germany, who dislike each other but both love me. I kept building up, because Napolean had a beastly amount of military and had been pretty much constantly at war on his continent for ages.
> 
> That's when I got the random event where I got to choose my reaction to a wedding between a native of my country and a native of the Khmer Empire, my neighbors on the little continent. I chose the option that would get me a relations boost with other people and piss of the Khmer, and the idiots declared war on me.
> 
> They wound up with four separate countries coming down on their deeply underpowered asses, and I sent my buildup of soldiers after the Khmer on the logic that more territory would ultimately help me be more able to kill Napolean. I had maybe, if I was very lucky, enough military force in Medina to take one Holy Roman city, two if Napolean mismanaged his resources really badly.
> 
> I wound up using a couple of elephant cavalry from the Colonies and the shitload of riflemen and grenadiers I'd intended to shove down Napolean's throat on the Khmer. I could have taken Kalakh, too, but the fight would have been costly and it would have dragged on for ages, so I vassaled the Khmer instead.
> 
> And then shit went really screwy as America started to badly outculture me. I'll explain more of that in the next chapter.


	6. The Toehold: A Sociopsychological and Military Analysis of the War of 1883 by Steven Harwood, Univeristy of Chicago, 1941

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I have cultural victory turned on, and it was starting to get to the point where I needed to pay attention to that. Imagine my surprise when, at the end of the war with the Khmer, I discovered that America had five cities that were all more or less untouchable in terms of raw cultural output. I was on track to lose unless I took Washington, New York, Atlanta, Philadelphia, or Chicago, and even if I managed to take one, I had no way to be certain I wouldn't be badly outcultured by one of the others. Naturally, I'd just crippled my offensive power by smashing it against the Khmer, but I set about rebuilding that army while I built up my defenses again and cozied up to my allies.
> 
> If it wasn't for that war with Carthage, I suspect I'd have been fine, but I had little choice but to act with both violence and a shocking lack of preparation.

There are some who believe the Celtic mindset to be inherently one of control. The war with the Khmer, pursued with the singleminded violence that reduced a nation to a city, resulted in Celtic control over the vast majority of a continent, and led directly to the Celtic share of the world being best expressed as a largeish fraction. Not more than half, but not less than a quarter. Perhaps a third, perhaps a hair less. 

In the climate, both literal and political, of the latter half of the nineteenth century, there was a tendency towards stasis, alliance, and control. The American Alliance, a longstanding pact between America, Japan, Greece, and, reluctantly, True America, had been born of ancient wars on the Greek Continent. To truly understand it, we must look at the truly ancient Greek Hegemony that once controlled most of the continent, but fractured into China/Japan, Rome, America, and the Greek Remnant around the year 6100 BCE. The second fracturing, this one over the Buddhist and Jewish religious reforms, came about in 1202 BCE and resulted in the final split between Rome and Holy Rome, and between America and True or "Native" America. 

That the power and influence of America was great enough to send their proud brethren scurrying for the cover of American protection is a profound sign of the course of events in the late nineteenth century, but the emergence of the Celtic peoples onto the world stage was a jarring event, as was the vicious war they waged to secure their place on the Russian continent. Here was a power unafraid of sending military force far beyond the experience of anyone. The wars between Holy Rome and America might pale in comparison to the concerted efforts of the Celts, and the American Alliance drew its ties closer to the Holy Roman Bloc. With Celtic trade and culture kept stubbornly out of the Greek Continent, the Celtic people were denied not merely control, but actual participation in the affairs of the largest landmass in the world. 

Civil unrest in the Celtic Federation accompanied continuing military unease among the leaders of the nation, and the advent of radio and the spread of the telegraph served to spread the feeling of resentment and xenophobia across two continents. Soon, there was a public feeling that if the Americans and Holy Romans would deny Celtia its place on the Greek Continent, the Celts would have to take it by force. This ballooned, and forced the hand of the Celtic military leaders. They were not ignorant. They pushed through vast technological advancements in the Celtic army before they moved. While the Americans dismissed Celtic posturing and maneuvering as a show of force to placate an excitable populace, the Celts prepared to strike at the vulnerable southern edge of American territory.

American citizens were appeased by a simple relocation of troops to Washington, where the Celtic fleet was just visible in international waters from airships bringing passengers to land from Chicago, but American leaders were tragically unaware of the indicator that the Celts were serious: the Celtic fleet was split in two, and while the Russian elements sat off the shores of Washington, the Celtic Native Fleet had departed Medina and swung north and east to wait a hundred miles out from Philadelphia.

The Celtic declaration of war caught American leadership off guard and the Celtic navy approached unchallenged. The bombardment of Washington was deadly, but it was accomplished from the water only. Since the loss of every single Celtic cannon on approach to Kalakh some thirty years before, the Celtic people had lost faith in land-based artillery and refused to fund the creation of more. For the assault on Philadelphia, the Celtic leadership had managed to beg and barter for several thousand cannons, which they upgraded as best they could, but these were all obtained on the Celtic Continent itself, and couldn't be sent quickly to aid in the assault on Washington. The assault on Philadelphia, on the other hand, was three-pronged.

First, it saw the first deployment of what modern sensibilities would call a "tank," sadly on the Celtic side. These weapons, though in short supply, protected the grenadiers and infantrymen of the Celtic charge, and over their heads, every cannon the Celts had assembled battered down the walls of Philadelphia like so many sandbags.

The taking of Philadelphia was not easy, and it bloodied the attackers, but they moved on towards Augsberg while the Greeks panicked and drew in their own defenses to the south of Philadelphia in Athens and Sparta.

With their tanks, armored cars, and vast ranks of infantry, the Celts could hold Philadelphia against nearly any assault, and clearly planned to. They might have done to America something like what they did to China some time later if their assault on Washington had succeeded, but at a cost of tens of thousands of lives and months of dedicated assaults on the invaders, the Celtic force near Washington was pinned and prevented from taking the city. 

When the failure of their effort became clear, the Celts retreated to Philadelphia and promised to become a sullen, angry danger on America's borders. Their war of aggression had established only a toehold, but the dangers of allowing them that toehold have become exceedingly clear since then, with the invasion of Southern Greece and the occupation of China. The "Native" American defection to alliance with the Celts has since weakened America's position greatly, and the American people remain vigilant against the Celtic threat, but with things as they are, it is doubtful the Celtic Federation will soon be able to wage a true war against America again, unless they are willing to reduce every square mile they take to the sort of irradiated rubble Nanjing is still said to be.


	7. The Sparta Mistake: a Criticism by Luke Trevor, 1909

The Second Battle of Augsberg was hell. The first one was almost a kind of fun, watching those big, stupid Celtic machines fail and die out in the mud by the riverside. The second one...

We didn't expect the Celts to try the damned war again, but when the traitorous bastards who called themselves "true" Americans went running to the Celts for protection and alliance, the Celts made another try. 

We had an airship. Just one, a huge, overbuilt monster that cast its shadow across the whole Main Street Center District, and we thought they'd have to be insane to attack it, but the crazy motherfuckers had been flying fixed-wing planes into Philadelphia for months, and the day they declared war, they sent four squadrons of airplanes after that airship.

It wasn't even a fight. They shot it down, and it burnt up half the warehouse district as it died. Hydrogen, the scientists said. Pah. Like we cared. I had my shiny new guns and an armored car, and I fought like the devil on those sorties. We dug the trenches four miles out and the bastards choked on our mud and dirt and dust and hate. 1896. The Year of Hell. Well, it went on for three years. Trenches are no place fit for a man. I lost as many friends to trenchfoot and gangrene and frostbite as I did to the Celts. With our airship gone, those crazy planes that they'd filled with guns and bombs couldn't be stopped, and it was only because there were so many of us that we kept the city. There honestly wasn't much city left to keep when they were done.

We couldn't understand how they stayed and stayed and didn't get tired, until one of our men saw a Celtic generator. They were making their own power, which made sense, but they had these boxes... well, you know them damn well, don't you. One in every home in America. Kublai Khan sold the Greeks up the river for them, and it'll cost us our country some day. I only hope I'm dead before that day comes.

They pulled cold food our of their boxes, and it was preserved well and they kept fighting. Their generals sat in mud-floored tents and drank ice-cold mead while howitzers battered us. I wanted to kill every one of them every day.

When they turned and left, packed up their army, we thought they'd had it. Thought we'd won. They were on the road back around the mountain to Philadelphia, and we had about five weeks to party and celebrate before we heard they'd hit Sparta to the south, and we realized the road around the mountain led to a fork. They weren't retreating.

They were hitting Athens.

President Khan sent us down after Sparta, and when we got there, it was flat.

They'd rolled into Sparta with tanks, taken it, flattened it, and left men. The tanks were off in the distance, rumbling away, and we hit Sparta before they could turn around. They couldn't answer our charge, and we held the city. Fortified it in a fuckin' hurry, I tell you what.

They sent a fifth of their tanks back at us, and we pulled off The Miracle.

We held Sparta.

The tanks turned around again. The generals sent my group out with about ten thousand men to go and do something about Athens, but when we got there, the word came through. We were on the hills overlooking the city. There were guns and grenades and everything staring us down, and they said no.

The war was over.

I'll tell you something. It's the truth. We had them, dead to rights. For the first time since Carthage, some fucker had the Celts on the run. We coulda pushed them out of Athens. We coulda pushed them out of Philadelphia. We coulda invaded. Taken the Russian Continent or crippled the Celtic one. It woulda hurt like hell. Thousands dead, hundreds of thousands, maybe millions. We might still be fighting. But we woulda won it eventually.

When I asked the general if we were gonna help rebuild Sparta, he shook his head. We weren't giving it back to the Greeks. We weren't even keeping it.

Kublai Khan will be remembered as the stupidest fucker in the history of America. The reason the history of America has a place where it ends. He sold Sparta to the Celts. Traded it away, and for what? So they would teach us to make their refrigerators. 

It must have been horrible, to be Greek in Sparta or Athens. To have a lousy bolt-action rifle and watch those tanks rolling in. I went to Athens as a boy, and I saw an OXCART in the street, right there on the main street.

They didn't have what they needed to fight, and we could have taken it all back, taken back the dignity and pride of America and Greece.

Instead, we sold Southern Greece to the Celts and left Northern Greece to sit and fester next to China.

Kublai Khan was no president. He was the biggest traitor in the war.


	8. Good Night America, Harcht 7, 1901, Opening Remarks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got engaged over New Years! My boyfriend proposed to me in front of a whole bunch of people and his own social anxiety, and of course I said yes. This is my first chapter on this site as an engaged man!

Good night, America! We have a lot of excellent guests lined up for you in the broadcast booth tonight, so I hope you're all looking forward to that. 

First up is New York's own Mayor Engels, taking a brief break from begging her constituents for votes to beg us not to kick her out of the studio! Then we'll have Justin Casper, the lead singer of the Lucky Strikes, discussing his group's new album and their experience with that new Celtic cassette thing we keep hearing about. Apparently, recording to one was a lot of fun! Finally, we'll round out the hour with a word with the children's group Little Minds, who've sent three absolutely brilliant representatives who will very much resent that I'm about to call them adorable. Now, let's take a look at the news briefs.

Apparently there was some strife in the ongoing peace negotiations with the Celtic Federation last week. As we all know, the Greek contingent was unhappy with the whole outcome, and who could blame them, I mean I'm sure all those Holy Romans in Mainz aren't too happy with their new neighbors in Sparta. I hear rumors that the Celts demanded they get the Greek delegation's rooms. I guess the Greeks objected pretty strongly, but when President Khan learned there was one of those little hotel fridges in the Greek rooms, he signed them right over to the Celts on the condition the Celts give him the fridge.

Which leaves the Greeks living in the Chinese delegation's closet, and we all know how well the Greeks and the Chinese get along. I mean, just ask the citizens of that lovely Northern Greek city right next to China. What's it called? Zhou? Lovely place. Lots of pagodas. Everyone is so fluent in Chinese.

In all seriousness, though, the talks are going well. The America and Fraud American-I mean "Native" American-delegates have been agreeing on a lot of salient points, and the Celts are pretty happy. I guess Japan has argued in favor of signing over Sparta to the Celts, and King Napolean the Immortal (the Seventieth) said that it was the only way to preserve peace.

Meanwhile, we've had rioting in Washington and Augsburg over the decision, and Kagoshima remains a center of opposition to any kind of peace at all. Remember after Philadelphia when they held a citywide "March For War?" Yeah, it happened again. They wonder why the army doesn't like to go there. News bulletin, my friends: you'd have better luck making the Celtic army understand you. The American Army thinks you're creepy.

I mean, you're not wrong. Most of the reports after action, the ones coming in from what used to be the front, are saying we could've taken the Celts and that's probably why they asked for peace.

Good luck telling President Khan that.

Still, it must've sucked to be King Afonso when the peace came around. I mean, just imagine it. There he is in Washington, walks into President Khan's office, and there's Kublai sipping a drink.

Afonso asks about Athens.

"Well, they called for peace before we could take back Athens."

Afonso asks about Sparta.

"Yeah, hey, Sparta is a bit of a tough subject. Take a seat. Can I offer you a milkshake? Cold beer? Ice Cream?"

"Kublai, where did you get the refrigerator?"

And then there's a long pause. And finally, Kublai says... 

"So you know where I hear is a really nice place to build a palace? Alemanni, up by China. You should make that your new capital."

"Kublai, what about Sparta?"

And the President presses an ice cold beer into his hands while refusing to meet his eyes.

All right, America, let's get this show started!


	9. Angkor.com Book Reviews: Poverty Point Series

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I use some made up Native American names here. Yes, they are meant to sound like a white guy coming up with Native American names. This is a series of books written by a Celt living in Bibracte in, like, 2038 or something. It's supposed to sound like a bad period piece with poor research done on it.

The Poverty Point series follows Native American citizen Little Horse as he grows up in Prosperity Point from 1891 to 1924. He lives through the dawn of the Atomic Age, the Poverty Point Asteroid Strike, the Chinese Invasion, and the Chinese-Celtic war.

Book 1: Prosperity Point, 1901  
($19.99)  
Little Horse is only one boy, and he barely understands the world around him, but he knows it's changing. In this first exciting installment of the Poverty Point series, his family moves from the army-controlled Military Sector of the city to the Economic Sector, and he must come to grips with the reason: Native America is leaving the American People behind after the Celts test a new weapon that could destroy whole cities.

Excerpt:  
Papa smiled sadly down at the table and sipped his tea. "I guess they called it an a-bomb. That's what Running Bear said. He looked like he'd aged about a hundred years since he left."  
Mama just shook her head. "Sweetheart, we can't leave the Military Sector behind because you're scared of one little bomb. The Celts love the Native Americans anyway! They'd never bomb us that way!"  
Little Horse watched his parents argue for a moment, but Papa was determined. Finally, he shot back "I've made my decision. It's not really the Celts I'm afraid of, anyway. I'm afraid of the Americans. They're cowards and usurpers, you know that! We all knew it was a bad idea to knuckle under and bow to them in the first place, and look what they did to Greece. I hear the Mansa is planning to leave America behind and try to make it as a country alone. If we're here, in the Military Sector, you know what could happen to us." He gulped at his tea. "And besides. It's not one little bomb. It's one big bomb. Running Bear says it left a crater and they didn't even blow it up on the ground. He says it could destroy a whole city. We're moving, and that's final."

Book 2: Disaster Point, 1912  
($19.99)  
Little Horse has just married and moved into his new house by the North wall of Prosperity Point. When the Poverty Point asteroid strikes, he must work to save his family and rebuild the city government before the Chinese army moving in from Nanjing can take over the city.

Excerpt:  
Little Horse looked up blearily from his morning coffee. His husband stepped into the kitchen and said, in tones of quiet disbelief, "what's that?"  
Little Horse followed his gaze out the window, to where the fireball was falling with ponderous grace to the plains below. It was heading directly for City of Iroquois, and when it touched the distant cityscape, Little Horse gaped. Iroquois was crushed. The city was destroyed, squashed under the massive fireball and washed out by a flash of light like Little Horse had never seen in his life.  
He thought back to his father, sitting at the kitchen table and talking about a Celtic bomb that could wipe out a city.  
It had been eleven years. What could that bomb do now?  
He grabbed Burning River and pulled him under the table moments before the windows blew inwards.

Book 3: Flash Point, 1917  
($19.99)  
China has declared war and marched on Prosperity Point and Mound City. General Little Horse of the Prosperity Point City Militia must fight a losing battle to save his city, but can he protect his people when his city still hasn't recovered from the Poverty Point Asteroid?

Excerpt:  
Icy Rocks dropped her gun. "It's no use," she muttered, again and again, as the Chinese soldiers marched down the dark street below. The thready noon sun was doing nothing to illuminate their targets, and the day was already lost, but Little Horse steeled himself, drew her up next to him, and slapped her across the face.  
"It's not. We can win this, Icy Rocks." He thrust the gun into her hands and pointed out at the marching soldiers. "Every man and woman out there is thinking the same thing you are. It's no use for us to fight. But let me tell you something, Icy Rocks: that's why we can win. They think we can. They think it's useless to try. They think we're all so afraid that we won't fight. And that's why they'll never expect it when they lose!"  
As he walked away, he knew she was going to die.  
But maybe because she died, a hundred others would live.

Book 4: Taking Point, 1920  
($19.99)  
The Mansa has begged the Celts for protection, and a Celtic army sweeps through Prosperity Point. Little Horse begins to wonder if the Celtic government intends to return Prosperity Point's independence, or if they'll keep the city permanently.

Excerpt:  
Ian Al Abri was a huge, intimidating man. Little Horse tried not to blink too much in his smoky office as the Celtic general put his feet up on the desk that had once belonged to Little Horse. "Of course we intend to give back the city. This is only an occupation for the safety of the Native American People. You have every right to give us input on the way this city is run. We only ask one thing: your cooperation. And right now, that means helping to put together a new military unit to help with the assault on Guanzhua."  
"Don't you mean Nanjing?" Little Horse asked.  
Al Abri chuckled. He lit up another acrid-smelling cigar and aimed a thumb out the window. "The boys in Rome have seen to that for us. When our forces get to Nanjing, they'll be waltzing into a crater, but it'll be their crater. You ever seen the Hammer of Thor fall, kid?"  
Little Horse shook his head.  
Al Abri smirked. "Give it a minute. It should hit any second now."  
And then it did.  
The air was so thick with dust that Little Horse had forgotten what the sun looked like. For a moment, he wondered if the Celts had moved the sun to the Northwestern horizon and cleared away all the dust. The flash was so bright he thought of the asteroid, all those years ago, but as it faded, the very top of a cloud could be seen, merging with the ash and dust already in the sky, a black smudge on a black wash.  
The thunderclap of the nuclear detonation rattled the windows, and Little Horse sat down.  
"Boom goes Nanjing, New York's gone,  
Called up Augsburg, something's wrong,  
they all hate us anywhow,  
let's drop the big one now!" Al Abri sang.  
Little Horse tried not to weep. He hated the Chinese, but this was too much.

Book 5: Poverty Point, 1923  
($19.99 paperback, $29.95 hardcover)  
General Al Abri has lost control of the population of Prosperity Point after two years of peace with China. It's up to little Horse to quell riots, change Celtic minds, and journey to Baghdad to convince the Celts to give his city back to its people, but Al Abri won't let him go easy.

Excerpt:  
"You can't," Owen said darkly. "If you walk through that door, Al Abri will know you're there. You can't."  
"And if he kills me for showing up in Baghdad, he loses, Owen!" Little Horse gestured wildly at the steps of City Hall. "There are a thousand people who can vouch for the dangers I faced to get here! If Al Abri kills me for this, he's admitting they're right. He's admitting that he can't afford to let the Council hear me."  
Owen shook his head. "I was there, Little Horse. You know I was there when the Chinese gave Mound City to the Celts. You know how much I objected. We had no business in China, and I would go through the whole war a million times if it meant I could save you again, but Little Horse, please... I can't lose you. And I don't think the Council will see things your way."  
"They have to," Little Horse told him quietly. He leaned his forehead against Owen's. "Prosperity Point is surrounded, my love. I can give you a new life there, but I have to do this first, because I want to give you that new life _there._ Right now, Prosperity Point is a foreign island in a Native American sea. If they give it back, we'll have Prosperity Point again. You know what they're calling it? They've renamed it after the asteroid. I don't want to take you back to Poverty Point."

Book 6: Prosperity Point, 1924  
($29.95 hardcover, $40 signed hardcover)  
The Celts have ceded Prosperity Point back to Native America, and Little Horse has returned with Owen and Aine, but all is not well in the city. The young hero of the Chinese War must adjust to life in peacetime and rebuild a shattered city under a cloud of dust and poverty.

Excerpt:  
Aine kicked her legs under her chair while Mayor Proud Frog paced. "It's a problem, Little Horse," the mayor said. "We had three years of riots and revolution, and it was all over the Celts."  
"It was all over China, Proud Frog," Owen began, but Little Horse held up his hand.   
"They'll see, sir. Owen is a hero. He's a liberator, and he helped to convince the Council to set us free."  
"He's a Celt," Proud Frog said. "There was an asteroid strike fifty miles away a few years ago. There's no light for the crops. You know what they're saying in the streets, Little Horse?"  
Owen began to object, but Little Horse cut him off. "They're saying the Celts can eat in Bibracte or they should starve in Prosperity Point. But they're wrong. That's how we'll destroy this city. We all need to work. You want me to fix this, fine. Get me enough soil to grow crops on top of my home. They want my family not to be a burden? We'll give the food away!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Explanation: in 1912, I got an asteroid strike random event which threw up a cloud of dust that tanked my food production and effectively killed off most of the world's population. Shortly thereafter, China went to war with Native America and the Native Americans lost two cities and asked to become my vassal. I swept China almost completely off the map, took every Chinese city except Beijing, and got them to give me Mound City in their surrender, but when I tried to keep Poverty Point, the Native Americans had their culture pumped so high I couldn't get any use out of the city, so I gave it back to them after a while.
> 
> I decided that the best explanation for all these events was that the asteroid strike was near Poverty Point and provided China a good window to invade Native America.
> 
> Hence, this.


	10. A Republic Responsible: The Problem of English Aggression, Speech to the United Nations, 1961

The dust has settled. These halls, which have echoed for nearly forty years with the sounds of international cooperation and peaceful coexistence, have seen one consistent source of strife and hardship. I am a proud citizen of Russia, and I hold to the old Asatru ideals my father's father's father instilled in me. I respect valor and righteousness, I uphold freedom and I defend the right of others to choose their paths, but the fact remains that the world is not yet recovered from the Great Disaster of 1912. 

I saw my first sunset when I was only seven years old, and ash still choked the skies. It was 1937, and the meteorologists called it The Year Of The Sun. You all remember it, I'm sure. Since that time, I have watched a great many sunsets, and I have always been concerned.

I do not ignore the depredations of my neighbors and allies. The history of Russia is, by necessity, the history of Celtia, and the history of Celtia is soaked in blood. But the last war waged by the Celts was one of defense, honorable and right in the eyes of history and the world, and the Celtic occupation of China has not only improved those places the Celtic workers can safely enter, it has ensured the safety and indeed the very existence of the Native American people. 

But I can no longer sit and hold my tongue. Our problem today, my friends, is England. Selassie's regime must be held accountable for its erratic behavior. I shall be clear: I do not wish Selassie removed. He has as much right to rule his nation as England's laws say he does, no more, certainly, but also no less. The United Nations exists, however, to prevent the excesses of unchecked nationalism and aggression. It exists to prevent war where possible, to minimize its effects and help the needy where not, and to defend us all from ourselves. I do not begrudge it that power, but rather I demand that it be used.

Twelve years ago, as 1949 was waning, as England, the nation least touched by the asteroid, was recovered enough to contemplate war, and so they declared it. English soldiers marched North through Celtia, English transports rounded the Isthmus of Bagacum and the Carthage Peninsula, and Germany was under siege.

As 1950 began to wail its infant cry, the English went to war with Holy Rome, as well, and their armies danced to the tune set so well by Selassie.

These were not shocking moves. We were surprised, of course, because these conflicts had long simmered without bursting into flame, but I will be completely honest: the wars were always prevented by the Celts before. The Celtic nation was a great barrier and a frightening military force between England and Germany. Either could reach the other, but the Celts had made it known that armies moving through their territory to attack either nation would not be welcomed with open arms, or housed in Celtic hotels, or fed at Celtic tables.

The Celtic Federation has, at times in the past, held a defensive pact with England and Germany both at once to ensure that neither would lightly attack the other because to do so would invite the Celtic Army to attack.

Forgive me if my history lessons are unwelcome, but I must press the need for the United Nations to act. Celtia was obliged to preserve the Native American Republic against Chinese aggression, and a huge portion of the Celtic military was devoted to the effort. The ambassadors of Celtia have come begging to each of you, offering wondrous things in trade for tanks and guns. Celtia cannot keep her allies in check alone, and she has been left to do so twice in recent years. It was not the United Nations but the Celts that stopped the war between England and Holy Rome in the same year it began. The war between England and Germany was one of old grudges and hates, and it was only with the help of Celtic negotiators trading on their nation's reputation for extreme prowess in war that convinced Selassie to back down in 1951. The specter of the Celtic Federation joining the war on the German side was enough, for a time.

But matters have changed once again. Native America is once again a part of the American Alliance. England once again uses its power and position where it should not while the Celtic military organizes and rearranges itself, and Selassie has declared war on the American Alliance. We all know what happened when the single greatest military force ever assembled charged pell-mell into the American meat grinder, but while you hem and haw and insist the Americans can take care of themselves, you forget that they can only protect so much.

Greece, Rome, Native America, and China all rely on American protection, and the Americans simply cannot protect them all at once. I beg you, delegates, act now before England destroys something more precious than we can afford to lose. Vote to end this war. England can run past the American defenders, but Selassie cannot defeat the might of us all. Do not let two years of warfare become an eternity of regret. The English war machine is poised for its first great victory, and I am begging you to prevent that same victory because each army occupying an innocent city is a tragedy.

Preserve the world.

End the war.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> England and Germany hate each other, but I cozied up to both of them really hard early on, so I've maintained defensive pacts with both of them in the hopes that neither would be stupid enough to destroy the other and destabilize my continent, dragging me into a war on my home soil that I was frankly incapable of really fighting well. During the China fiasco, though, I was forced to go to war with China by accepting Native American vassalhood (which they then renounced to go running back to America, the obnoxious little fuckers). That dissolved the defensive pact, and I was only able to reestablish it with Selassie. That was enough to prevent German aggression, but the English took it as an invitation to be colossal dicks and started declaring war on everyone.
> 
> I actually did use the UN to stop the war with Germany, but now Germany accepts the defensive pact and even though I am apparently close enough with Selassie to invite him over for a beer and brats, he won't do a defensive pact, presumably because he likes war a lot more.


	11. From Above: A Celtic Retrospective on the Beginnings of the Moon Colony, by Leo Stynch, 2102

On Baldersmon seventeenth, 1962, on the hottest day in Angkor Wat's recorded history at the height of the Northern Hemisphere's first summer unfiltered by asteroidal ash and dust since 1912, a Celtic factory rolled a platform the size of a school into the searing air.

The Vegetation Crash of the early thirties and forties had mostly ended, but its long-term effects meant that the trees of the surrounding jungle were stunted or gone. The lack of shade would have been enough to kill the men and women working on the platform if there had not been enough shelter along the route the platform took to its final resting place to the East of the city. It was a single piece of milled steel, the largest ever created, moving on vast treaded tracks and mounted over huge engines and a small control room. It was topped with concrete and other things to make working on top of it possible, and when it reached its destination, it immediately turned back.

Three weeks later, it returned to its place outside of the city, and Humankind's first moonshot was launched atop the famous Brokkr III rocket. After the disaster of the 1964 explosion, the new Gungnir rockets were built and tested, and in 1966, the first Gungnir moonshot successfully orbited the moon. 

It was always the Celtic intention to colonize the moon, as the endless Celtic need for expansion fueled their interests, but this, the Celtic Overgovernors insisted, would not be a place of war. 

"Anyone leaving Earth's atmosphere will not be a citizen of any nation," President Smernen explained to the United Nations the day the Gungnir rocket returned. "I am prepared to put the full force of the Celtic Federation's military behind the sovereignty of space. I have already created an armor division, with all the equipment necessary to ensure the safety of astronauts and space-travel endeavors. I ask for soldiers from every country, from every city and town and village, to man the army that will protect space from the savagery of war."

It was a noble sentiment, and one in keeping with the later Celtic charge towards nuclear disarmament. If the horrors of the Greco-Celtic war had already been and gone, there is little doubt that Celtia would have combined the nuclear and space programs to turn Earth's most destructive attention to where there was enough room for even vast destruction to go unremarked. It was also a shrewd political move, and one that allowed espionage and cultural infiltration in ways the world hadn't prepared for. The Celts had an advantage in the diffusion of culture and knowledge, but their advantage was so slight as to be almost nonexistent. To prepare to play a game, one must have all the rules, and the Celts had designed only the game board.

For the most part, though, the Celtic move worked. A multinational army of elite soldiers sprang up, dedicated to preserving the safety and independence of space. The Space Force exists today, and is the last remaining bastion of several old cultural identities. Chinese citizens may be found exclusively in the Space Force, and many soldiers still wear the ancient American flag. 

With the help of the Space Force, three more moonshots were launched, and on New Year's Day, 1967, Gungnir 11 pierced the thin clouds over Angkor Wat. This fourth Gungnir moonshot blew past the early manned satellites in low Earth orbit and the first primitive, unmanned Geosynch Station. 

People across the world watched at any television, listened at any radio they could find. There were parties to watch, in color no less, as the five-man team stepped out of the Excursion Module and began to take apart the plating on its exterior. It was the work of six days to build the framework that Gungnir 12 would expand on. In between building the beginning of a Lunar colony, there was science done, and the astronauts even composed poetry and had time to sit and tell stories or sing.

The team consisted of Celtic pilot Lou Malley, American technician Jennifer Waterson, Chinese construction specialist Hu Jie, Greek astronomer and navigator Alma Nadopol, and Celtic flight engineer Aine Lewellen, all of whom left poems of their own composition in a locked vault far away from the colony they had begun to build. These were retrieved just three years ago, and one of them is shown below.

From Above  
Hu Jie

I am up above,  
and I see my home below.  
I see China there  
and I see my humble home.

We are nothing here  
and I see Earth from without.  
We are lonely here  
and I see Earth's a redoubt.

They are down below  
and I am far above.  
They are lonely there  
and I am happy from above.


	12. From "Citizen For Life" 2-Hour Comedy Special by Justin Wu, 1992

(The entire special is filmed for holotheater release on a living room set, which is projected all around the viewers. Justin delivers this portion of the monologue from a plush chair to the viewer's left while smoking a cigar and sipping a cup of tea)

Ninety years of national indignation can lead to people doing some really dumb shit for some really shitty reasons, but I think the worst combination of "stupid" and "shitty" I ever saw was in Cahokia in 1968. Now, about here is the part where you're gonna start saying I'm full of shit, but let me just point out that I'm not legally allowed to leave the city of Angkor Wat.

I was born in Holy Rome. My dad was Chinese, my mom was American. I was confused. But I got really good at languages 'cause I had to know Apache, Mandarin, and Eastern Latin just to talk to my family and friends. And then I learned Cherokee 'cause I had a huge crush on basically everyone from that Warrior Tournament Power Souls cartoon and I got really into Native American cartoons in college. And I learned Gaelic and Khmer because at this point, if the comedy thing fell through, I figured I could just become a translator or a circus freak.

The Boy Who Understands Everything would've been a fuckin' dull circus act, I tell you what.

Anyways, after college I get a comedy job, and I follow this guy clear out to Snaketown as a warm-up act before I get an amazing offer from a guy who runs a comedy club, so about '65 I moved to Native America, and I was in Cahokia working this bar I probably didn't have any business in down by the Security Bureau. This place was lousy with fuckin' spies. There was this one guy who was really bad at not being a spy. You'd be talking to people for twenty minutes and he'd be there the whole time, just being innocent and harmless until you realized you'd ignored him so hard that he now knew several of your secrets and you hadn't intended on that. We'll get back to him. I never actually knew his name, so we'll call him Creepy.

Well, this other guy started coming in. A Greek guy named Aris Antoniou. 

I know.

I'll just wait patiently while you finish yelling "bullshit."

Now, Aris, he comes in once a week, maybe twice a week, and he's always with the same dudes. I work out that he's a spook pretty quick, but whatever. I work in spooktown, there's gonna be spies and shit.

Well, one day, Aris tells me about how he's working on using the Space Force for espionage. 

I go, "well, of course. Get some of that cool space technology for Greece."

He says, "No, like sleeper cells. We've got them all over the Russian Continent by now."

And then Creepy says "Tell me you're joking," and we both jump about a mile in the air. And when I come down, all I can think is Creepy is a spook, and he knows some important shit, but he had no idea about this. So here's this random Greek asshole who's so focused on hating the Celts and getting one up on them that he wants to brag about having sleeper cells across one of the core parts of Celtic territory, and the Native American spy that a whole bunch of other guys treat like he's The Boss, capital T capital B is shocked and dismayed to hear about it.

And I think to myself, "those fuckers didn't tell the Americans or the Japanese about this, either, did they?"

Well, when the Mansa pulled Native America out of the American Alliance the next year, the travel restrictions eased way down, and I found a job as an exotic act at a nightclub in Khoisan.

Calm down. I know it sounds crazy.

So, there I am, it's 1970, and Aris motherfucking waltzes into my club. I'm looking at him, thinking if he's here, he's still got a job, because if he lost that job, he probably got killed for it.

And I'm thinking about how if he's still got that job, there's no way he isn't here on business.

And I thought, real clearly, "this guy hates my girlfriend." 

I was dating two girls at the time. There was a Russian girl and there was a Celtic girl, and they were always laughing with each other over how they got the sexy foreigner. And me, I guess. And I was looking at Aris and I thought about how he'd been bragging because he had people in position to kill a lot of Celts.

So I went to the City Council. The council member that I spoke to listened to what I had to say, and she said she'd look into it, but she kinda said it like she wouldn't. Anyway, two days later, we're all watching the Gungnir 13 crew liftoff from the moon when the cops come in and just sorta take Aris away really quietly, and then one of them grabs me and goes "You need to come with me, sir."

It turns out, I gave them the tip, and they were putting me in protective custody. And then 1970 happened. Oh my god. They moved me from Khoisan to Baghdad to Moscow and finally just kinda turned me over to the Space Force because the Space Force was the most pissed off at Greece and grateful to me.

I told this story in a club once, and some guy goes "you started a nuclear war!"

I told him "I prevented Greece from stealing your nukes. Kiss my ass."


	13. The Death of a Nation: America 1972-1975, Essay by Madge Hopshire, 2002

China abandoned ship the instant they understood what was happening. Ultimately, it didn't help much, but there's a certain healthy respect that comes from watching one of your cities be obliterated in nuclear fire. It had been a long and relatively peaceful decade in which war, at least, hadn't touched Chinese shores. Drust Luigsech, Secretary General of the U.N., had spoken on the subject of sending aid to Shanghai, and in the wake of China's near-destruction at the hands of the Celtic army some fifty years earlier, the long and arduous recovery of Chinese industry and culture was fragile. China could not afford another war, and so they left the American Alliance and sought the protection of Holy Rome.

The Native American Republic had already left the Alliance, and Japan had always been a little hesitant about the military aspects of their obligation to America. Greece, though aggressively willing to provoke the Celtic temper, had no means of assaulting their potential enemies. After the provocation offered by Greek agents in Khoisan and Angkor Wat, A rapid breakdown in diplomatic relations began.

The Celtic navy, carrying many tens of thousands of troops, began to menace the coasts of America and Greece. Japan, though unmolested, was not permitted to forget its own vulnerability, as Celtic ambassadors reminded the Japanese of their position nearly every day. 

Ultimately, it took two years for war to erupt, in the late summer of 1972. The Celtic army that landed a few dozen miles to the east of Alemanni met minimal resistance there and began to bombard the city while a Celtic force of truly immense size, already massed in Sparta and Philadelphia, began a headlong charge into America. The Mount Philadelphia Reserve Strategic Force began to charge down the slopes only to see a detachment of the Celtic army far beyond the size they expected.

The Celtic Federation had been busy. Furious backroom deals had seen the Celts employing a familiar tactic on a far grander scale than ever before.

The Celtic war machine was always slow to build, but Celtic engineers were indescribably brilliant at stripping down and retrofitting old equipment. While the rebuilding of military materiel purchased from other countries in exchange for vast sums of money and technological secrets was by no means the fastest process in the world, it was far faster than building the Celtic military had been. Celtia possessed the firepower and tonnage to take two, perhaps even three of the American cities, but only in a fully-committed attack, and while dealing with the MPRSF would always have been necessary, it was expected that this would be accomplished by weathering their attack and counterstriking. The aggressive move was a needless sacrifice of personnel and equipment. 

American General Howard Rowe realized his mistake when his force was fired on from nearly ten miles away, a single rocket that arced over their heads at an angle to miss them. His last words as he was obliterated by the blast wave of the nuclear warhead that airburst over his army were reportedly a prayer for the deliverance of America.

After the nuclear blast, the American attackers were sliced to pieces by the Celtic army from a distance. There was little they could do to defend themselves, and they were slaughtered to a man. Their fate was quickly echoed by the fate of Augsburg as a much larger missile leapt over the mountain to deal a horrendous blow to the city.

While the Celts moved in cautiously, the shocked Americans could only gape at their opponents. A nuclear attack was an atrocity, but two in the same day was unheard of, and these were not bombs dropped by airplanes. They were missiles. America had no defense. The Greeks, true instigators of the war, cringed as they waited for the missiles to come, but they never would. Celtic strategic planners had determined, quite correctly, that no such hammerblow was necessary to bring Greece to its knees. Indeed, the battles on the icy shores around Alemanni bore out that conclusion, and the Celtic push southward took Zhou in less than a year's time.

Indeed, Alemanni and Augsburg were both in Celtic hands before the New Year, while America struggled to bring any military force to bear on their enemies. A sizable force of mechanized infantry rolled through the Holy Roman outpost-city of Mainz on the way to Washington while an armored convoy brought another set of nuclear warheads to Augsburg on the heels of the victorious assault force that took the city.

The American counterattack seemed to be on course to go unmolested in their push for Athens and Sparta until a pair of tactical nuclear missiles caught nearly the entire American army in the field. From there, small detachments of the Celtic army were able to carve the American forces into pieces. Washington was hit with a nuclear attack the week before the Celts reached it, just as Boston had been earlier in that year. On the taking of Boston, the Celts had moved more nuclear missiles into the city, and on the taking of Zhou in the far north of the continent, they had sent most of the force that took Zhou and Alemanni running through Native American and Holy Roman territory to join the attack on America. On nearly the last day of 1973, as Atlanta burned in anticipation of a Celtic force that might have taken it without the benefit of a nuclear opening round, Japan abandoned their allies, suing frantically for peace with the Celtic Federation and their allies.

In the opening days of 1974, a nuclear attack was launched from Sparta to Chicago, softening the island city for English attackers persuaded to to join the war in exchange for possession of the lucrative ports and industries of Chicago. The English took Chicago with minimal effort while Kagoshima, formerly a Japanese city occupied by American troops, was left undefended against the charge from the north of the former Greek invasion force, which took the city without meaningful resistance. The Japanese forces in full retreat ignored the former Japanese territory as a condition of their treaty with Celtia, and sat back as the last true bastion of America's once-mighty military dug in for the inevitable nuclear attack.

But the attack never came. Although facilities capable of firing the missiles could be built in any fortification advanced and permanent enough, their support systems required a great deal of maintenance and so the Celts were forced to fire them from nothing less than a true military bunker or base. So quick was the Celtic assault that no such place had been secured close enough to launch the short-range tactical missiles that were their chief weapon.

Instead, the Celtic navy bombarded the city from offshore while rocket artillery attacked for several weeks.

New York was a battered mess by the time the vast, concentrated force of the Celtic army hit it, but alone among America's cities, they had not been hit with atomic weapons.

The Battle of New York was a terribly lopsided fight. The Celtic assaults beforehand, though not nuclear, had been so thorough as to eliminate nearly a third of the military forces remaining to America, and resistance, though determined and stiff, was simply overwhelmed by numbers as a force that might have been sufficient to take two or three cities as well-defended as Augsburg had been ended the American Dream once and for all.

Ultimately, the American fall can be attributed solely to the advanced weapons of the Celtic Federation. Celtic air superiority did not exist. American and Celtic fighters and bombers were roughly on par with each other, and America had them in much greater numbers at the beginning of the war. It was expected that any Celtic attempts at nuclear aggression would be long-range attacks with bombers. The use of short-range missiles caught the Americans completely off guard and invalidated many American tactics that the Celts could use with impunity thanks to their opponents' lack of comparable weapons. Clustered armies were vulnerable as targets to the full force of a nuclear attack, and so the American tactic that had previously so frustrated Celtic efforts at expansionism served only to throw troops into the meat grinder and leave them unable to act as a dangerous fighting force.

A spread out army would have had much less concentrated effectiveness and been vulnerable to other forms of attack, but might have taken enough pressure off of the American Coastal Stretch in the south to prevent the fall of Washington or New York.

Even with this tactic, however, it would have ultimately been impossible for America to stand against what some contemporaries of the assault's organizers called "Celtia's game of nuclear leapfrog."

Without the ability to instantly cripple the defenders of any strategically important place, each Celtic death would have been inexcusably expensive in the currency of American lives. If Philadelphia of Sparta had not been so well defended, an American nuclear counterassault might have been launched, but the very possibility of this disaster dictated the Celtic nuclear response to the encroaching armies of America.

Of the wars in the history of the world, this is perhaps the most unfortunate. The death of America, more than any other war, has had a lasting effect, and the Celtic tactics, though bold and brutal, were not in any way without consequences. Fear of a new Celtic campaign of aggression saw the Celtic Secretary General of the U.N. replaced by a German. The sheer recklessness of the attack caused the spread of nuclear fallout across the planet, and the war with America led directly to the Holy Roman Crisis and the ensuing war.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I never built a single ICBM, and and it showed in the way I conducted this war.
> 
> Honestly, though, it kinda converted me to tactical nukes. While ICBMs are really useful for opening volleys, I basically ran a point-defense of Sparta against what turned out to be most of America's offensive power with just tactical nukes. crippling with instant-response nuclear force is what saved my bacon at Philadelphia and Sparta both, and if I hadn't played a little game of nuclear leapfrog across America from east to west, I would've run into the same problem as before.
> 
> It turned out that America was loading at least half of their total military into Augsburg and assaults on my front lines. Once I broke that, the interior of the country was basically the chewy Tootsie Roll center of the lollipop that is America.


	14. Exceprts From Franz Kafka's "Truth," Published in Atlanta in 1980, and Commentary by Dr. Julia Bernard, University of Rome

This excerpt from Franz Kafka's influential 1980 work "Truth" is one of the most famous pieces of twentieth century literature. In it, Gustav Marcus has just returned from a trip to the country to find that Washington has been destroyed by a nuclear missile.

+----+

It was his understanding, then, that his country was gone. 

This was the fundamental tragedy of the disenfranchised, that that which they have hated all their lives is that which they have most longed to have. What was rubble except for the remains of all that Gustav had ever hated? His fingers trailed through the dust and leavings of the building that had been beside his home some days prior.

Of his own house, there was nothing left. This was not so terrible a thing except that his mother might have been visiting at the time, and he couldn't help feeling bad if she had died in his home. That she was dead seemed obvious. The power of a Chinabomb was a well-known terror, and he had already surmised it was only a matter of time before something like this happened. This had happened while he slept in a cheap motel halfway to Atlanta, and there was a certain guilt in not having stared at the horizon to watch his city fall.

Few had come from American soil into the city, especially with the knowledge of what had happened to those present in Nanjing in the immediate aftermath of the bombing. Anyone sane was, after all, very sensibly fleeing. Gustav brushed some dirt off of a concrete foundation and sat. A Celtic soldier could be seen in the distance, coordinating an evacuation. Someone's home had collapsed. It looked like the Petersons.

"This is a curious thing," Gustav thought. "I ought to be very angry at the Celts, but I'm simply too tired. It might be that I've been out, but I suspect it's either that I've come down with radiation sickness or that I just don't mind them." Another soldier spotted him, and began to walk towards Gustav with a concerned look on his face. "Plenty of people hate the Celts, but I don't. I can't say I'm pleased about what they've done, but all of these fellows are only doing what they've been told, and that's exactly what I've always done."

The soldier stepped up to Gustav and helped him up. He said something in Gaelic, which Gustav had never learned, and Gustav replied in Russian, "I don't understand you."

"You don't understand very much at all, do you, Gustav?" the soldier asked pointedly.

Gustav checked to see if he was wearing some sort of identification, but of course he wasn't. This was a queer thing indeed.

+----+

The publishing and distribution of "Truth" led directly to the death of its writer at the hands of an angry mob of rioters, but the larger narrative won out in the end. Kafka had a point, strangely made though it was. His tale of telepathic Celtic soldiers and nuanced narratives of what could best be called abject fear illustrated for still-resisting American readers both the ultimate futility of their rebellions and the flawed truth of both their previous and their current government. 

Kafka drew the conclusion, over the course of slightly less than sixty thousand words, that the fastest way to attain freedom is to act as though you have already attained it. Once brought up, the idea took hold in formerly-American minds, and instead of rioting and looting, the newly-Celtic citizens of New York, Boston, Atlanta, Washington, Augsburg, and Kagoshima began to truly look at what was causing them the most misery and hardship.

It was from the American Territories, therefore, that the cry first went up to go to war with Holy Rome. Their claiming of a massive swath of territory from Mainz north around Augsburg and Boston clear to Goth was a huge drain on resources badly needed by American cities devastated by the nuclear war.

Celtic aid was reaching the cities, but Holy Rome had claimed territory that had once fed most of America and was refusing to let food flow to cities that now belonged to a tradition rival. The final scene of the novel illustrates the point perfectly.

+----+

As Gustav lay back on the grass, he wondered at the conspiracy that had slain him. Most conspiracies, he knew, were malicious things in which many sought to destroy few. In this case, chance had conspired with Celtia and his own choices to destroy him. In all honesty, Gustav did not place blame on any of them. They had meant only to assault him.

His stomach hurt terribly, and every few moments he coughed up blood. The soldiers, the Celtic ones who knew his mind, had told him he was nearly finished. A soft rain began to fall, twitching the blades of grass around him and making the lawns of Washington's outer districts dance. The raincloud glowed fractionally brighter than most of what was around it. Gustav was not sure if this was a hallucination, but he also did not see any point in learning if it was.

All of Gustav's blame was reserved for the man who could have prevented his death.

It was a far greater sin to refuse to save a life than to end one assuming you will only control it. The hospital had refused him on the assumption that he was a murderer by association, just as the soldiers warned. To learn their trick of talking to minds instead of men had at once saved him and killed him.

He considered trying once again to use his tongue, but it would remain limp and numb in his mouth if he did.

Instead, he closed his eyes and elected to die quietly. This, at least, had one virtue: it was not what anyone had told him to do, but rather what he had decided.


	15. Change of Hands: The Early Holy Roman War, by Wilhelmina Murphy, 2031

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just got cultural victory today, after some crazy events leading up to it.

The ultimate source of the conflict between the Celtic Federation and the Holy Roman Republic is best understood in the context of America as it was. The Ancient Greek Empire, when it first fragmented under the strain of trying to maintain an empire across a continent without the benefit of telecommunications, fractured into American, Sino-Siamese, Roman, and the remnants of the original Greek components, but ultimately, these far-flung cultures split again into the historically-familiar arrangement.

To wit, the American continent was arranged like a pie chart, roughly. The topmost and thinnest slice was the Northern Greek State, a conquered pair of formerly-Sino-Siamese cities and the lands shared between them and resting on the northern edge of the Native American lands. Moving clockwise there was the narrow slice of Siam, roving as far south as the city of Gaul near the center of the continent. Further was the Holy Roman Empire, a broad section which was interrupted in its southern extremities by both isolated eastern American city of Philadelphia and the Southern Greek State, consisting of Athens and Sparta. Continuing west along the southern coast was America itself, a sizable chunk of the countryside, then Japan, a squat, squarish country almost entirely composed of coastlines. The Roman Sea occupied nearly a quarter of the pie in the southwestern corner, and Rome made up perhaps a tenth of the pie directly on the northern edge of the Roman Sea. North of this was the long, wide stretch of China, from Shanghai to Nanjing.

America and Native America were, thanks to this arrangement, the only formerly-united countries to share a border by the time of the Holy Roman conquest of Gaul around 1200 BCE, and the longest border on the continent at the time stretched along the northern edge of America, dipped south, and met the Arabian Sea on a nearly three thousand mile stretch of raw border tensions. To make matters worse, Augsburg and Mainz, Holy Rome's two southernmost cities, claimed borders that meant the American city of Philadelphia could be reached from any other part of America only by ship unless the traveler was willing to pay extravagant fees to pass through Holy Roman territory.

This was settled partially with the settling of the island-city of Chicago in the Arabian Sea and partially with the American conquest of Augsburg in 102 CE, a move which eventually led to the slow downfall of Mainz and the waning of Holy Roman power some fifteen centuries later.

The ancient Holy Roman origins of Augsburg and Mainz, however, and particularly of Mainz, proved to be a great obstacle for the Celtic Federation in the wake of their conquest of America. The United Nations, shocked by the brutality and recklessness of the Celtic war machine, failed to legally define the new borders in official session, and the Holy Roman president, speaking in cooperation with the seventy-third in the line of Napoleanic Kings, issued a statement in early 1976 to the effect that he was annexing the territory around Augsburg in order to connect the Holy Roman city of Mainz directly to Goth and the rest of the Holy Roman Republic in the north.

More galling by far to the Celtic peoples than the claiming of this territory was the Holy Roman assertion that both Boston and Atlanta lay within the rightful borders of Holy Rome, as well as Augsburg. While the claim on Augsburg was expected, the claim on the two northern cities of the former American Republic was audacious, to say the least. It was met with enthusiasm by the former Americans at first, but a fundamental difference applied to Holy Rome and Celtia.

The Celts were interested in growing industry around and rebuilding the former American cities. Holy Rome wanted to own them for the sake of an ancient grudge. Several Holy Roman scholars published widely-read papers throughout the late seventies and early eighties to the effect that Atlanta, Boston, and Augsburg were all effectively Holy Roman cities anyway. Meanwhile, the Holy Roman annexation of land fed Napolean's cities and starved the war-torn, atomically-devastated cities. It was in these three cities that the anger of what had been America first began to turn away from the Celtic Federation and towards Holy Rome.

The movement began after Franz Kafka's famous 1980 work "Truth" made the very reasonable point that Holy Rome was keeping valuable farmland tied up in overfeeding Holy Roman cities and towns while their neighbors starved, and that this farmland was well within the old borders of America.

Anti-Roman violence and nonviolent crime rose swiftly throughout the late eighties as Celtic military forces began preparing for war. The steady purchasing of military equipment from other nations continued, with a special focus on basic mechanized infantry. Holy Rome breathed a sigh of profound relief when the Celtic Federation spearheaded the UN call for nuclear non-proliferation. While the exact number of Celtic nuclear weapons wasn't known, it was estimated to be vanishingly small.

In the early winter of 1988, it was revealed that one of those weapons was in Sparta. The Celtic declaration of war was formally received thirty minutes before a nuclear missile was launched from Sparta to Mainz, and a sizable detachment of the Celtic army rushed the city. Their first assault was repelled by the battered defenders, thanks to reinforcements from outside of the city, but Mainz was not the main thrust of the Celtic assault. Instead, the vast majority of Celtic military power had been loaded onto transport ships and brought to the eastern coast of the American continent, just south of the Siamese border. The rush against and amphibious invasion of Prague remains the single largest coastal invasion in history to this day. While military strategists continue to debate the wisdom of landing so large a force in so small an area, in this case, the move was well-considered. The bombardment and taking of Prague was accomplished by sheer, overwhelming numbers, and left enough of a reserve force in the city to virtually guarantee its continued occupation.

Holy Roman spies might have had the opportunity here to turn the war around. Celtic leaders had moved one of the remaining nuclear weapons to the invasion force for use in a worst-case scenario, and if detonated in Prague, it would have left the Celts cowering for cover while the majority of Holy Rome's army attacked them. However, most Holy Roman forces were withdrawn to the capital and prepared to fight a desperate battle in the hopes that they could emulate their Chinese allies and make their capital too dangerous a target to bother taking.

Meanwhile, a few scattered Holy Roman generals in the south began a counterattack. Boston, Augsburg, Atlanta, and Philadelphia were all attacked by Holy Rome. While Augsburg and Philadelphia were an old stronghold and a military jumping-off point, Atlanta and Boston were underdefended and fell to the determined Holy Roman attackers.

This state of affairs did not persist, and the changing of it is considered a turning point in military history.

Until the retaking of Boston and Atlanta, raw power was considered the deciding factor in most large-scale confrontations. It was for this exact reason that Celtia had brought in its traditional allies, Germany, England, Russia, and Kalakh. Speed was an unfortunate lack in nearly every warrior's repertoire, but this was expected. The Celtic detachment that retook Atlanta and Boston could not come from the Mainz assault force, which was still occupied with its invasion. The men that took back Boston came from Augsburg, but in order to leave enough defenses to hold the city in Augsburg, the army that retook Boston was barely enough to take and hold the city. There was nowhere nearby that could provide the needed soldiers.

But there was a group that could do it. The Gallic War Brigade was a Celtic special forces unit of some one thousand men and women trained to operate deep behind enemy lines. They had been intended to act as advanced harrying forces, disrupting Holy Roman supply lines and attacking the flanks of the enemy's armies. When word of the capture of Atlanta reached Prague, General Gwendolyn Harp took the Gallic War Brigade south through the entirety of Holy Rome. Traveling in stolen vehicles, in secret on trains, and through whatever other means they could find, the Gallic War Brigade covered nearly three thousand miles of enemy territory in less than a week and infiltrated Atlanta, destroyed the Holy Roman forces holding the city, and secured their reputation as heroes.


	16. Getshwayo, Letter to President Brian Al-Mufti of the Celtic Federation, Shainuary 31, 1989

My Respected Opponent,

I surrender. I have fought you in the streets of Shanghai. I have watched twelve thousand men become two thousand. I have watched your tanks and APCs roll down streets that I walked as a boy before I began my political career. I have watched Shanghai fade into the distance as my soldiers took my to safety.

First, you killed my soldiers. Then, you killed my congress. Then, you sat in my city, so close to Rome, so close to the sea, and your men danced in the snow and played on the ice to celebrate their victory.

I have heard the news from Holy Rome. You are an ember, touched to a sheet and left to burn. I have fought you with everything I had, but it is like fighting the ocean.

I have occupied an abandoned fortress to the south of Guangzhou. I am here with three thousand soldiers, half so many civilians, and a small number of advisors. We are an army without a nation, and all that is left of China.

I surrender, because you will soon find me and destroy me otherwise.

I surrender, because I have already lost.

I surrender, because my ancestors angered yours.

I surrender, because valor is nothing if it is untempered by wisdom.

I offer you my pride.

I offer you my hope.

I offer you my service.

And I surrender.

In humility and awe,  
Getshwayo, once Prime Minister of China, now no one.


	17. Holey Rome: An Analysis of the Strategic Weakness of the Napoleanic Army During the Celtic-Holy Roman War, by Isra Tawfeek, 1999

Although Holy Rome was one of the greatest powerhouses of the first half of the second millennium CE, it was around 1600 that their power began to fade.

This can be attributed most easily to the loss of the territory around Mainz. The southern coastal city is today known as a middling center of economic and industrial power in the Celtic Federation, but its importance to early Holy Rome is astonishing. Mainz commanded a large stretch of land and allowed for the movement of foodstuffs and luxury goods into the Holy Roman Empire. It can be said to have fueled much of Holy Rome's early technological advances, and its absence is clearly tied to the scientific stagnation of the late Republic Stage of Holy Roman history.

Besides having a weak technological base, Holy Rome had learned from the fall of America to spread their armies, but hadn't taken into account the nuclear non-proliferation treaty that left Celtia with between three and seven nuclear weapons in total. These problems were exacerbated by the Holy Roman focus on their border with Celtia. In short, it was a perfect setup to deprive Holy Rome of multiple resources in rapid succession. The permanent loss of Mainz on the southern coast heralded the northward journey of many spare Celtic soldiers, and while the small-but-real threat from the south worried the cities of Goth, Gaul, and Vienna, the titanic force that had taken Prague divided itself up and set out to take individual targets.

A swarm of tanks took Nonthaburi, left a rearguard, and moved on towards Pak Kret while the nuclear missile in Prague was launched at Aachen.

Let us not deceive ourselves: this war was not fair. The sheer power and raw numbers of the Celtic invaders doomed Holy Rome from the start, but the defenders at Aachen might have held onto their city and survived as a Celtic commonwealth of some power and prestige. The bombing of Aachen removed that chance.

Ultimately, the cause of the Holy Roman fall was a deep-seated disunity.

Pak Kret and Nonthaburi were Siamese cities originally, and when Celtia returned Pak Kret to Siam, they bought peace with the Siamese Republic.

With the fall of Aachen, Nuremburg was the new capital of Holy Rome, but it sat so close to the Native American border that nearly half of its citizens felt a greater affection for Native America than for Holy Rome, and as Native America was a loose ally of Celtia, they helped the invaders to take what was then the largest city in the world.

Goth, north of Boston, held out for a time, but was too distant from reinforcements to be held, leaving only Gaul, and this is where things become truly tragic.

King Napolean the Seventy-Third, upon fleeing Aachen, had taken a regiment of soldiers and sixty rocket artillery trucks as escorts, and had sought to duplicate Getshwayo's surrender by securing himself on a mountain north of Mainz. It might have been his ultimate plan to rule Mainz as a king. Whatever else he hoped to achieve, he failed. It was the intent of the Celts to ignore him once they had secured the last of the former Holy Roman land, which he made easier by tendering a surrender that a large portion of his military believed he had the authority to tender.

This final blow to Holy Roman unity had the defenders of Gaul acting not so much stalwart as confused. Minor instances of surrenders had occurred throughout the four years of the war, with increasing frequency after the fall of Nuremburg, from which a huge portion of the Holy Roman Army hailed.

Napolean might have been allowed to remain on his mountaintop were it not for the events in Verlamion six months after the fall of Gaul, the last holdout of Holy Roman territory.

Boudicca Keo, a general in the prominent Celtic city, attempted a coup with a company of paratroopers and moderate public support, claiming that the remaining Holy Roman soldiers were a threat to the safety and security of nearby Sparta and Mainz. Although she was apprehended and executed personally by President Brian Al-Mufti, her soldiers were promised that they would not be punished, and then were sent off to be the first wave of the assault on Napolean's well-fortified position. The traitorous paratrooper company was killed in its entirety before the rest of the assault was launched, and with that act of brutality, the Holy Roman War and the Holy Roman Republic both came to an end.

Holy Rome was, from the time they lost Augsburg to America, in decline. Multiple governmental changes failed to end their prominence and power thanks to the traditional core of their government, the reputedly-unbroken chain of succession of the Napoleanic Kings. Napolean the Immortal was a practically mythic figure, and a powerful rallying cry for the Buddhist nation, around which their culture recongealed time and time again. While the actual succession of the Napoleanic kings is questionable at best, the notion of a continuous national identity built around a hereditary ruler has the major advantage of holding together a nation that should, by rights, fall apart.

Unfortunately, Holy Roman conquests and expansionism meant that on the outskirts of the once-great nation, Napolean the Immortal was not respected or revered, but rather resented and reviled. This played, perhaps deliberately, into Celtic strategy in the end. Nowhere have more of a city's defenders surrendered outright than in Gaul: an independent city, once taken by Siam, influenced by Native America, America, and Japan, officially owned by Holy Rome, and therefore bereft of true belonging. Gaul was an outpost, not a redoubt, and when it was left as the last stronghold of Holy Rome, there was no more doubting the destruction of a nation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next time: not war! We've got the Summer of Love in 1994, Updates on China and the Space Program, and... okay, some more war, but not my war.
> 
> Stupid England and Germany just won't stop fighting, and there I am, the country sandwiched between them like the kid in the middle of the backseat, hoping his little brothers will just stop fighting for once and leave him in peace.


	18. Perspectives on the Summer Of Love: Ten Years Later, Carthage Informer, Shonx 2004

Basra:  
They told us not to go, but the world was ruined already. The desert outside the city was contaminated, but that was nothing new. Everything was contaminated. It had been almost twenty years since the American War, and everything had a bad habit of glowing at night.

I grew up in Cahokia, but when I heard the Celts were going to be throwing the biggest party ever, I knew where I had to be. It was for peace! It made all sorts of sense to gather together in a city where the literal fallout of war sat sullenly on the horizon. I hopped on an airship and the only place I didn't see fallout was over the Arabian Sea, and that was just where I couldn't see it. I knew it was there. We passed over Washington in the middle of the day, but it was cloudy, and I looked out the window. Every single lake was glowing.

I remember that when I got to Basra, I made a beeline for the center of the Summer Of Love. I stood under the sign at Seventh and Christchurch, and I got handed a tab of acid, and I spent the rest of the day tripping. When I got to lucid again, it was evening, and I'd followed Jennifer Kalash, _the_ Jennifer Kalash, straight to the corner of Mirska and Aine, that huge hill at the northern edge of the city. She had us all sit down and she rolled about a hundred joints and we watched the sunset over the sea, and we watched the evening grow.

The sand in the desert around Basra had something in it that made it pick up the radiation and react and glow a sort of dull red. They warned us to stay out of the desert, that it would kill us. Ha. They didn't get it. Going into the desert would have been like trying to appreciate a pointillist's painting from a single dot!

+----+

Baghdad:  
The military had just started replacing the old jet fighters with those crazy new scramjet things, and they spent the summer of '94 drilling with them over the city in an incredibly precise formation. Well, beat poetry was a little old-fashioned, but one day the flights go by overhead, and we get about five minutes of distant, muffled sonic booms, and someone in the flat I was staying in breaks out a beat poem that uses the rhythm of the scramjets to keep time.

Well, that turned into a _thing,_ and next thing we know, the military police are trying to break up the groups of hippies on the streets because we all have the training schedule memorized and it's supposed to be a big secret. That was how it became us versus the military. They had just imported a bunch of outdated equipment from England that spring, and they were rolling those new ACVs out of the garages on a regular schedule, so we'd line up on the sidewalk when one of them was due to roll down. We had shirts on that said "I am a Celt," no matter what country we were from, and as the big machines rolled down the road, we'd collapse in their wake. 

The soldiers hated that. It was great.

+----+

Rome:  
We didn't really participate. The Summer of Love was this thing that was very Celtic, very foreign. It was technically only in Basra, and everyone else was just sorta following along, but it was impossible not to hear about it. I do remember that was when the Celts got Shanghai back on its feet. They had a couple of music festivals there that summer, and it was all these big, popular bands, so people would go to Shanghai to check it out. After that, you couldn't avoid Celtic culture. Look at us now. The Roman Metropolitan area has been slowly bleeding into Celtia ever since.

+----+

Bangkok:  
It might have worked in another city. The police were so strict that summer that you couldn't jaywalk without getting arrested. We were Proud Citizens of Siam and we wouldn't be involved in that Awful Celtic Nonsense, but when we stood on the southern shore we could _see_ Celtia. I bet they bought it in Phoenicia, but we could see that the Celts weren't rioting and looting and burning.

I know the Celts are going to take over some day.

I look forward to it.

+----+

Kyoto:  
You couldn't see the sky. There were so many walkways between the skyscrapers that you never had to touch the ground, and the constant rainstorms left sheets of water falling off the edges of the skywalks. People got mad at us for the smoke from the drugs, so we used this new Celtic thing that worked with nanites, and we'd walk around for days with our brains buzzing from the psychedelic machines in our bodies until they died off.

It was cocaine and nanodream, and when we wanted to smoke something, we went out to a balcony or to a roof when it wasn't raining. Everyone else in the world was partying and watching the sky, out in the open, but the most beautiful moment of my life was high on nanodream and pot, sitting under a walkway on a balcony and listening to the rain roaring and hissing at me while the wind whipped it around.

In Celtia and Native America and Russia and Kalakh, it was about peace. In Kyoto, it was about beauty and serenity.

+----+

Aachen:  
They'd just finished the arcology. Only the second one in the world. This enormous dome over the city, and it was a whole new thing. A whole new sky. Aachen was gone. Sky City was here. That summer, we started a petition to change the name on all the paperwork, and everyone started arguing about what name it was supposed to be. Sky City, Peacetown, someone got about a thousand signatures on a separate petition to rename the city just "Fuck."

They never got the name changed officially, but when the biggest party in the world renames your city, it still kinda sticks.

+----+

Kalakh:  
'94 was when the Movement started. There was a Summer of Love party every day that year, and we had people coming from all over. A huge Russian man told me one day "so few of you speak Khmer in public. It is all Gaelic. Why have you not surrendered yet?"

That was the thought underneath it all. Queen Chey had capitulated so that Kalakh wouldn't need to surrender, but so long in the shadow of Celtia had left us absorbed. We started organizing and talking, because if the Khmer people were so permanently glued to Celtia, there was no reason not to officially join our masters. It would improve our lives, and make travel easier, and everyone would feel a tighter sense of national unity. We're taking the petition to the U.N. next week.

+----+

Berlin:  
The Police started it. There was a protest down by City Hall against the peace with England. When you have an ancestral enemy like that, people want war sometimes. Well, all the Summer of Love stuff was in high dudgeon at the time, and the police went to break up the protest. The problem was that the protest was completely legal. It was a whole group that was trying to impose peace for political reasons. Well, the precinct sent down more cops to stop the ones who were going rogue, and they started fighting each other. Eventually, they realized that they had devolved into armed conflict over whether armed conflict should be allowed, and they stopped.

After that, the police department started organizing "Celtic style" parties and events. Thanks to the summer of '94, I got handed drugs by cops more than anyone else in my entire life. You haven't lived until you've seen a cop do a hit of acid and strip down to go swimming in the sea.

+----+

Moscow:  
It was all in solidarity with the Celts. Everything is, eventually. We heard what was going on in Basra, and we started throwing parties. I went through every city in Russia and watched the parties and celebrations. For once, the world was at peace, and everyone was happy. It was incredible.

+----+

London:  
When we heard what was happening in Berlin, we were furious at first. But someone had a German cousin, and someone else had a Celtic brother-in-law, and we decided it wasn't the time for carthagicy, so we all moved on.

It was nuts.

There were German-themed events all over. We had bratwurst and schnitzel, and passed around German beer and got completely wasted on all sorts of strange things. I hope the peace lasts forever.

+----+

Cahokia:  
We were all nervous because of the Japanese until we heard they were partying, too. A couple of us snuck into Chaco Canyon and came back with about ten thousand doses of nanodream. After that, there was no stopping it. It spread across the whole country like wildfire, and we barely knew where we were some days. I woke up in Nuremburg once with a Celtic cop loading me onto a truck to get sent back to Native America. Fucker handed me a bag of weed and told me to share in the truck. Those Celts knew how to party.

+----+

Basra:  
It had to end eventually. Jennifer Kalash overdosed on heroin on the Sixth of Luden, and that was it. Five months of nonstop partying, and the woman who was closest to in charge of it was dead. The next three days were a wake, and after that, people started going home. I'd gotten married at a party to a nice Russian couple, and when they told me they were leaving, I told them I couldn't go with them, so we had to go to the courthouse and find out if it was legally binding. Turned out it was, and we had to get annulled from about a dozen people.

Jennifer Kalash's funeral was all weeping and colored balloons, and we loved and laughed and said our goodbyes. But when I traveled to Russia last year, I looked up that couple. I think everyone who was there is trying to recapture that feeling all the time. It was an amazing event to be a part of, and I'm glad I didn't miss it.


	19. Letter From Getshwayo to Celtic President Brenna Albertson, Harcht 31, 1996, Shainuary 7, 1999, Baldersmon 11, 2001

My Respected Colleague,

Last week, your ambassadors brought a pair of chefs who showed my people a type of cuisine popular in both your lands and in Japan. This "sushi" was efficient and tasty, and it easily fed all seven thousand of us a rare treat of fresh fish. It took only ten chefs to prepare such a treat for my entire nation, and I reflected yet again on my lot in life.

I am certain you are growing weary, as did your predecessor and his predecessor, of my constant letters, but I promise you there is substance and meaning in this. I give you the news of my total surrender. Yesterday afternoon, a child was born in my little town with a terrible deformity. Your ambassador was still here, and she had a doctor look at the child. The conditions in my tiny nation are to blame for the boy's deformity. I do not cast blame on you, though many of my countrymen wish me to. Instead, I blame only my choice of shelter and prideful refusal to become a citizen of Celtia.

And yet, my people will not allow me to dissolve China.

This letter, which I have sent at the highest priority and in the utmost secrecy with your ambassador, is my request for your help. I beg you to consider it in full. Your space program (for I know that the technology and wealth that hold the ships aloft are both Celtic) is the only refuge left to my people. I look around myself and I see the arcologies and jumplanes you have surrounded yourselves with, I see the wonders of your cities and all of your power, and I know that you can shelter my people.

I offer you this: provide me the technology and knowledge, and I will provide you the labor to launch a city into space. Be it piecemeal or all at once, you shall have a colony far above us, one that will serve you for a jumping off point leading you to the stars. I know your national ambition, to bring the people of Earth to other worlds, and I approve of it. Let China lead the way, that we may have our dignity.

Getshwayo, Leader of China

+----+

My Respected Colleague,

Things go well here. Geosynch Station has expanded greatly, and I am pleased to report the station has reached its final spin speed. At the rim, we have slightly more than Earth's gravity, and the zero-gravity area at the center serves as a fine arena for sports and theater. The counterweights have been moved from all but seven sections of the station, and we await only a dozen shipments of air.

My own health has taken a turn for the worse in this world of constant rotation, I am afraid. Since the launch from Bagacum last year, my bones have grown brittle and my stomach has been used to freefall. Now I am getting used to standing and to walking again, which is a difficult exercise. How soon we forget that which was once instinctive!

We have laid the first beams and structural members of the ship you have tasked us to build. The English engineers you sent are brilliant, as are the Holy Roman immigrants who have joined us.

I hear of tensions rising again between England and Germany. Do you plan to intervene in their wars again, or are you going to let this one play itself out to the grim conclusion?

Getshwayo, Commander of Geosynch Station

+----+

My Respected Colleague,

Tell me I have heard falsely! The news is that Coventry has fallen to German guns! The last of my people to arrive told me that the ancient English redoubt so near your borders now flies a German flag, and the Germans court your old allies the Russians to join their war. Last I heard, Yuri Alekseev is too wise to join them, but his successor may not be. 

I was delighted by my visit to your capital following my last letter, and while I understand if you do not wish a repeat of the experience, I will always remain your servant. You need only call upon me. Sadly, I doubt I can be of much service in most areas, but I hope to at least see the sky from time to time. One forgets how much that shade of blue means after a while.

The _China_ progresses well, and I have little doubt that we will achieve the goal you have set for launch by 2045. I hope the biological samples are ready? Our entire species will be well served by this achievement, however long it may take to reach the nearest stars.

Yours in truth and in devotion,  
Getshwayo, Commander of Geosynch Station


	20. Khmer-In-Celtia: A Retrospective, Wow! Magazine, Shonx 2007

Last Fall, the United Nations officially recognized the Khmer Territory as a part of the Celtic Federation, over the restrained and popularly-irrelevant protests of Queen Chey VII. The Khmer monarchy has been officially reassigned as the governor of the Khmer State rather than a foreign sovereign, and Queen Chey resigned immediately in protest, only for her daughter, Chey VIII, to be voted into the office by an overwhelming majority. Wow! Magazine has compiled a whole host of interesting articles from the past about the former Khmer Empire, and they're all available online at cen.wowmagazine.lit/khmer, but here in the pages of our hard copy magazine, we'll be taking a look at the fascinating popular cultural trends of the Khmer over the last two centuries.

**The Contact Period**

The 1800s through 1830s were the beginning of Khmer pop culture as we recognize it today. The woodcut cartoon below shows a typical Khmer noble in Yasodharapura, and compares her to the Roman, Celtic, Greek, and American visitors to the Russian Continent at the time. The Khmer enjoyed close ties with America and Rome from the time of their first contacts with them, and it shows in the way the noblewoman dresses. 

Probably the most influential piece of Khmer pop culture in the Contact Period is the first known syndicated cartoonist, Veasna Soun, whose episodic comics lacked a formal title and followed caricatures of famous leaders throughout world history representing their nations and municipalities in a running commentary on contemporary events. Although the author died in late 1837, the comic itself was continued by her son afterwards for another twenty years, and was eventually even given a title; _Worlds Apart_ remains one of the best selling comic collections in history, and is used in textbooks worldwide to illustrate the years of history it covers for students of all ages.

The Khmer people's introduction of cartooning to the world established them as a cultural powerhouse.

**The AntiCeltic Period**

Around 1830 until the end of the Khmer War in 1848, tensions with the Celtic Federation were high, which is obvious from the Khmer riots throughout the Russian Continent that marked the start of the war. The biggest influence in this time was the Celts, thanks to the determined Khmer rejection of everything Celtic. Dresses like the one photographed below were popular throughout the Empire, simply because the conservative styling and large volumes of hoop skirts were very different from Celtic fashions on the continent, which tended towards the practical and slightly risque.

After the Celtic invasion of Angkor Thom, Celtia became an even bigger influence by dint of their method for reducing Khmer resistance in conquered cities. The GroBel Doctrine removed more than a million Khmer citizens from their homes and sent them to Celtic and Russian cities while moving Celtic and Russian citizens into the conquered areas. While this ultimately improved conditions for the relocated Khmer people and allowed rapid advancement of the former Khmer cities by importing skilled laborers who upgraded infrastructure and brought new technologies to the areas, it also provoked outrage in the ever-shrinking Khmer territories. 

This time is best exemplified by the epic poem _Paean For Nagara Jayasri,_ a collaborative poem consisting of one stanza each from four hundred displaced residents of the titular city, published despite harsh resistance by Celtic officials in 1853.

**The Unity Period**

From 1848 until her death in 1872, Queen Chey III pushed for closer cultural ties to Celtia, arguing that peaceful coexistence and friendship with the Celts would go a long way towards improving the Khmer lot in life. From her official residence in Mecca, she passed edicts banning all hate speech and standardizing harsh penalties for crimes against foreign nationals on Khmer soil. During the Unity Period, the Khmer city of Kalakh became the world's model for an egalitarian society, and cultural assimilation of nearby areas was a foregone conclusion, so that after the end of the Khmer War, the borders of the Khmer Queendom actually expanded thanks to Celtic towns and villages voluntarily joining the Khmer.

At this time, Khmer composers began to distribute printed music for ballads and madrigals extolling the virtues of a peaceful society, and the Khmer musical scene was popular worldwide. In 1872, though, Chey IV took the exiled throne, and her Celtic upbringing showed through her policies.

**The War Period**

Chey IV popularized action and adventure as the primary form of fiction in Kalakh, and did a great deal to push the Khmer people towards a positive outlook about the looming possibility of war with Holy Rome or America. This brought Khmer culture to an unfortunate standstill, and the War Period is sadly devoid of anything interesting, since it echoes Celtic culture at the time so neatly. Even the propaganda isn't very good, with a lot of references to and imitations of older trends to try to appeal to patriotism.

Although the nostalgic/Celtic aesthetic did its job, most cultural historians and fashionistas will tell you that the Qeendom was never the same after 1872, when Chey IV killed its "golden age."

**The Interwar Period**

From 1884 to 1896, a great disappointment in their Celtic allies swept through the Queendom, and Khmer culture became a little obsessed with mourning. Funeral rites for soldiers lost in the First American War were so common that high fashion became synonymous with funeral fashion, and a lot of modern Emo culture hails back to this time for fashion tips.

This painting, from 1892, is a portrait of the mayor of Kalakh in stark black clothing, with her hair cut short in the traditional Khmer mourning style and her eyelids made up in black in order to show off her somber look a little better. If you look closely, you can even see the Broken-Balder pendant she wears: the first known image of one being used as a fashion accessory instead of a religious icon.

**The Asteroid Period**

Kalakh was fairly close to Poverty Point in the grand scheme of things, and the storms in the Roman Sea carried dust from the Poverty Point Asteroid directly into the Russian Continent. Crop failures, deaths, and darkness led to a strange transformation in Khmer culture, which had begun to abandon its funereal leanings after the Treaty of 1901 proved Celtia could compete with America in war.

The founding of the Khitty Khompany in 1915 is generally seen as the height of the Asteroid Period, with the cheery messages and helpful products of the company quickly achieving popularity worldwide.

Unfortunately, this time of growing Khmer influence came crashing down when Celtic bombers dropped an atom bomb on Nanjing in 1920. Celtic ally states were suddenly treated with suspicion, and although the Khitty Khompany now distributes toys, clothing, and household products through stores in nearly every major city across the globe, the bright and happy look of their products was considered offensive for some time after the bombing.

**The International Period**

From 1923 until 1960, the Khitty Khompany and a multitude of Khmer and foreign imitators held sway over Khmer culture. While the aesthetic didn't remain static, a remarkable homogeneity dominated fashion and pop culture. Seen here is a protest in 1949. No less than half of the people present are wearing the same outfit, an unusual circumstance which could only have occurred in the "cultural wasteland" that fashion writer Louis Schuchert called the Khmer Queendom in 1954.

**The Space Period**

The Celtic push for the moon began a worldwide obsession with space, and from 1960 until the Third American War in 1972, Khmer culture was just as obsessed as anyone else.

The popular Khmer television show _Starliner Gravity Queen_ influenced science fiction writers since its premier in the fall lineup of 1966, and its impressive twelve-year run reflects the Space Period beautifully. It was the first popular fiction show to depict nuclear weapons onscreen, and is widely credited with beginning the discussion of nuclear nonproliferation. 

_Starliner Gravity Queen_ enjoys massive popularity today as well, with five movies, two spinoff series, and a slew of video games, comics, books, and holoscenarios based on it.

**The Nuclear Period**

The Third American War, of course, left its mark on the whole world, and Khmer culture during this time was focused partially on the push for nuclear nonproliferation. Until 1985, when the nonproliferation treaty was signed, Khmer was the Land of the T-Shirt, specifically these charming and very famous shirts with anti-nuclear slogans printed on them, which are now collector's items.

**The Peace Period**

Throughout the Holy Roman War, Khmer citizens protested Celtic and Khmer involvement in the affairs of Holy Rome, and the hippie movement began in Kalakh at first. Clothing like the flower-power garments shown here could be seen on every street corner, and the philosophy was taken up by Celtic citizens in a heartbeat.

The hippie culture that spread throughout the world and led to the Summer of Love also pushed for Khmer integration into Celtia, and is still going strong today, although the maturing of the original hippies has led to a more conservative style like the one depicted below.

**Now**

This photo, taken three months ago, is of a group of schoolchildren waving Celtic flags in front of their school in Kalakh as their new national flag is raised. Keep an eye on the Khmer state, readers: they've set fashion before, and they're bound to do it again.


	21. News Blog: Celtic Informer, Ainuary 3, 2011, Shonx 3, 2011, and Harcht 21, 2012

Ainuary 3, 2011

Tensions Rise in Nuremberg Over Secessionist Raks

Multiple police crackdowns in Nuremberg have failed to apprehend the hackers who broke into the city council's official Raket account for three hours last Thorsday. The initial incident, in which the hackers posted two hundred and seven Raks calling for Nuremberg to secede from the Celtic Federation to Native America, reignited the dormant debate over the city's disposition, and there have been incidents of hacking on both sides. On Setsday, a secessionist Raket feed was taken over by an unknown anti-secessionist group or individual and spent half an hour repeatedly posting the message "Celts in Cahokia," provoking fear among ethnically Native American citizens, who reported there had been increasing incidents of race-based harassment and discrimination.

The city council's Raket feed was hijacked during a secessionist protest at City Hall, which had been called a "riot" by police twenty minutes earlier after a group of teens began to throw trash at officers. The teens, who were found to be in possession of several empty nanodream-13 containers, were a multi-ethnic group, but two of them, whose names have not been released yet, had relatives at the protest, and the situation was nearly under control when the Raket account was hijacked. 

The secessionist Raks provoked anti-secessionist counter-protesters to attack the secessionists amid accusations of an attempted coup, and nearly twenty people were killed, and three hundred injured, when the day was over. Although some groups have taken credit for cyber-attacks, the perpetrators of some twelve incidents over the last six days have yet to be identified. 

"It's a top priority," said Septimus Saqqaf, leader of the police task force dealing with the crimes. "We're working with the FAIC on trying to find these people, but the fact is that it's difficult to be sure how many groups there even are. We're receiving a lot of help from Cahokia."

The Native American National Defense Department, which has opened a shocking portion of its operations to Celtic scrutiny in order to allay suspicions that the hacking may be the work of the NDD or its sister organizations in the Native American government, has contributed significant manpower to finding the culprits in cooperation with Celtic agents.

"We'll get them," Saqqaf added. "It's inevitable, and they'll be punished in accordance with the law."

+----+

Shonx 3, 2011

Nuremberg Citizens Riot, Hundreds Injured

The Nuremberg police department reported five deaths on the force, and at least twenty civilian deaths last night, on the fifth consecutive night of frequently-open combat on the streets. As inflammatory remarks, social media posts, protests, and even graffiti have divided the city along political and cultural lines, at least three factions of rioters have begun to clash in the largest city on the American Continent. 

The groups, which support secession to Native America, the declaration of a resurgent Holy Roman state, or Celtic expansionism, have all rioted individually on various occasions over the last five months, with every week interrupted by civil violence at least once, but riots have been confined to small conflicts with few injuries until Rasday, when a secessionist mob's location was sent to members of an expansionist militia group, kicking off the largest Celtic riot since the 1848 Khmer Riots.

Military units have been called to action in the city, protecting various buildings, and attempting to curb the rioting, but violence continues along political and racial lines.

+----+

Harcht 21, 2012

Japanese Tech Team Apprehended On Charges Of Sabotage, Espionage

A combined NDD/FAIC task force arrested a team of twelve Japanese nationals in the Nuremberg suburb of Cadolzberg early this morning. Charged with sabotage, espionage, incitement to riot, fraud, impersonation, slander, several dozen counts of murder-by-proxy, and illegal accessing, the hackers are reportedly linked to the Japanese Osaka Agency, and possibly were sent to incite rioting in the city.

Celtic and Native American ambassadors in the Japanese capital have already been granted increased security, and Russia has completely withdrawn its diplomatic ties.

Japanese citizens' advocacy groups have contacted Nuremberg police to sue for the release of the Japanese team, which was in the country on a work visa as skilled computer technicians for a windchaser array being built to harvest wind energy to the east of the city. Claims that the team are innocent workers have been made, and the Japanese government is backing them up.

Meanwhile, several anti-war groups have already begun to lobby for a peaceful resolution to the tensions between Japan and Celtia, and a new Raket Cry has begun trending: +whogetsnuked, which is already linked to subCries predicting a Celtic obliteration of every major city in Japan, the entire Japanese countryside, and even some Celtic cities.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the middle of 2012, I got an event notification. Nuremberg, which had had riots all the time at first because it started out almost within the borders of Native America, was rioting again, and it was worse than usual, and it turned out it was because Japan had decided to worsen a riot that was already taking place.
> 
> I had to move my military across a lot of territory and kind of organize to crush them because I didn't have a solid jumplane network set up yet, just electric railroads with jumplanes here and there.


	22. Letters Between Justinian, President of Siam, and Dido XVII, Empress of Japan, Shonx 2014-Shainuary 2015

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Be warned: there's a string of really graphic insults at the end of this chapter.

Shonx 11, 2014

Esteemed Empress,

I must beg you to tell me this is not your fault. While the actions of your countrymen are not in dispute, I have always believed better of you. You are not a fool, and you do not act lightly, but what has been done in Nuremberg is foolish and dangerous. 

I know that your role is not what it might have been in times gone by. I know you do not control every aspect of your country's policy, law, and actions. But I also know that you could have done this.

I will be plain. Our defensive pact was meant to deter a Celtic war of aggression. It was meant to make the Celts believe we were too large a target to be fought lightly. What has been done in Nuremberg is an act of war beyond the scope of our alliance. I cannot condone it, and you knew this already. The Celts are dangerous libertines, sinful, loose, and avaricious, but they are still human and your spies took liberties with their lives and safety that have killed hundreds, and for little gain.

You heard the remarks of my ambassador, the speech I gave at the U.N. condemning the attack on Nuremberg. I did not call it an act of war then, but each passing month of this crisis leaves Japan more guilty in the eyes of the world, and my citizens will not tolerate a war to defend an act of terrorism and mass murder.

It is with regret and trepidation that I must begin the dissolution of our alliance. Please inform your Prime Minister at once, so that she may begin negotiations.

Justinian IV, Supreme Leader and President, Siam

+----+

Shonx 31, 2014

Justinian, my Beloved Friend

I had nothing to do with it. I swear this to you on my life and my empire, but I fear my time grows short.

No army in the world can hope to stand alone against what my spies have seen approaching from the north and east. It is not a military force; it is a horde. I hope to hold Satsuma, but it is a faint hope, and without the aid of Siam, I expect I will be unable to so much as bloody the Celts' nose. I beg you to reconsider your stance. I may be able to persuade Rome to join us, and if I can, I hope to keep some part of Japan.

The Celts are not invincible. Reinforce your cities, send aid to us, beg Rome to join our alliance. With courage and strategy, we can prevail.

Dido XVII, Empress of Japan.

+----+

Baldersmon 17, 2014

Esteemed Empress,

I cannot. Siam is desperately ill-prepared to repel an invasion. Even now, the Celtic Federation masses an army on my southern border. They expect negotiations to fail, and if it occurs, my people will perish in droves. They will perish for a cause they no longer believe in. I can make them do a great many things, but a Supreme Leader leads only so long as revolution does not topple him. 

I promised my people that our alliance was for defense alone. Your agents, whether they are ordered by your esteemed personage or not, have abused it. Their actions have taken a purely defensive shield and used it as a shroud behind which to commit acts of violence. 

The friendship and support of Siam cannot be made into permission to provoke catastrophe. Two hundred years ago, the Khmer woke a sleeping giant, but your people have approached that same giant and offered it a grievous insult and a stinging wound.

If I could, I would defend you, but any attempt would draw my army directly back simply to maintain control of my own nation.

Justinian IV, Supreme Leader and President, Siam

+----+

Baldersmon 28, 2014

Justinian,

You threaten the lives of my people. Even now, the Celts sit on my border, and every day their army grows.

Have you no sympathy?

Dido XVII, Empress of Japan

+----+

Ainuary 8, 2015

Esteemed Empress,

I have sympathy. I also have empathy, or have you not heard of the horde I am staring at even now?

I can spare my people. I can spare myself by doing so.

I will not destroy my nation in a vain defense of yours.

Justinian IV, Supreme Leader and President, Siam

+----+

Ainuary 16, 2015

Justinian,

History will recall our stand against Celtia more strongly than America's, if only you will join us! Let us together be a new Carthage, let us take back by wits and grit what so many others have lost.

The names of Siam and Rome will be sung on the streets of Kagoshima, of Siam and Japan on the rooftops of Nubia, of Japan and Rome in every house in Pattaya.

Dido XVII, Empress of Japan

+---+

Ainuary 24, 2015

Esteemed Empress,

Promise me the alliance of Native America, and I will join your war.

Justinian IV, Supreme Leader and President, Siam

+----+

Shainuary 1, 2015

Justinian,

Native America will never join us. You may as well ask me to gain the aid of Germany and England. I allow that you have reduced me to begging: please, aid me.

Dido XVII, Empress of Japan.

+----+

Shainuary 7, 2015

Esteemed Empress,

I am afraid the matter is closed. You have heard my price, and I cannot be bought for less.

Justinian IV, Supreme Leader and President, Siam

+---+

Shainuary 21, 2015

Justinian, you whore-rejected son of a traitorous lech. May nanites infest your soil and asteroids crush your land. May your mother be fed to you on the cock of a walrus. Every misfortune the world may conceive should be visited upon your head and your seditious fingers should be cut from your pustulent hands. Every god that has ever been worshipped should be set against you, and your body should be kept alive in a pool of battery acid.

Climb to the top of the Bangkok Tower and throw yourself off. Submit yourself as a mate to every animal in the Zoo of Pak Kret. Devour a tree's worth of spoiled crabapples and follow them with hemlock tea.

You have doomed my people, and your callous soul is worth less than the drippings from a diseased camel's asshole. You are an ape's concubine, the unvalued offspring of a mule and a dog, with a hologram for a mind and a lump of unworked clay for a body. I hope I live to watch you writhe beneath a torturer's blade, and if I survive what is to come, I will do everything in my power to put you there.

Dido XVII, Empress of Japan


	23. From "Running Ahead," by Hiro Nakazami, 2022

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anyone who wants a good look at a firsthand account of the bombing of Hiroshima, one of the best pieces of graphic-novel literature I've ever read is Barefoot Gen. Check it out, but be warned: you will cry.

"Running Ahead" is a Japanese-style anecdotal novel exploring the resistance movement after the Celtic invasion of Japan and during the Celtic-English War that followed quick on its heels. It purports to be a factual account, but events after the summer of 2021 conflict with established history even after three decades of hindsight. This excerpt, from the fifth chapter, is about the nuclear attack on Satsuma and it details a surprisingly common narrative; some two and a half thousand survivors of the attack on Satsuma settled in Gaul, Chaco Canyon, Kagoshima, and Washington.

+----+

The fact is that we had no context. All that partying on the day the Celts declared war wasn't really out of futility. We were armchair nihilists, laughing at our upcoming deaths without really grasping that we were likely to die. We knew in our heads that there was an army to crush a nation heading for our city, but we didn't know it in our souls.

When we heard about Chaco Canyon, we all thought "of course. We took it in the American War. They were only cooperating to avoid another nuclear holocaust."

When the sirens went off, we all thought "well, of course some poor fuckers are getting nuked. It's the Celts."

We didn't ever think they would nuke Satsuma.

Watching the missile break the horizon from the direction or Kagoshima was like watching one of those space launches. I recalled the time I went to Angkor Wat and saw off a moonshot, back in 2009. It was eerily similar. I had binoculars, and I watched the column of smoke in the distance, like the most serene thing you could imagine. When it headed our way, I thought, really, honestly, that they were hitting Osaka. I felt pity as the tanks and soldiers that made Satsuma such a hard target busted about on the streets far below me. I expected Osaka to be hit with a coastal invasion just as they were trying to recover.

And then it started to drop.

I raced down the stairs from the rooftop. I was racing a ballistic missile, and I knew I couldn't win. I heard people in the apartments nearby, some of them sobbing and some of them laughing and a whole lot of them making loud, scandalous love because they wanted to die happy.

I was almost to the lobby when the windows blew in. Ever since Japan moved to the tower-cluster model of urban development in the eighties, experts had ranted and raved about how those at the bottom levels of a city would be protected in a nuclear attack.

Some of us even were.

Every connecting skywalk, every pane of glass and antenna and balcony in the city, they all crashed to the street, shattered and shredded by the shockwave. My eardrums burst when the shockwave hit me, but I didn't die. It was only because I was so deep in the building, I'm sure.

I walked out of the stairwell when it was over, and everything was silent. It wasn't that it was actually quiet. I was told later that it was very loud, with screaming and fires and some secondary explosions. 

I felt something, a liquid running in a trickle down the side of my head, and I reached up to touch it. There was blood running from my ears.

I couldn't hear anything, and so my experience of the aftermath was one of perfect silence. It was painted in grayscale. Dust from the buildings above coated every surface. Beneath the dust, most things were scorched or otherwise damaged by the heat of the blast. Glass crunched under my feet, a series of tiny vibrations while I walked.

A man ran past me, burning like a torch, and I looked into the sky. I should have been looking directly at the sun, but instead the sullenly-glowing mushroom cloud blocked it all out. The sky was gone, black and angry red, a smear of smoke and death.

I set out from there, alone, to leave the city, and when I did, I could see the Celtic army coming. Satsuma was a city on a hill, almost unassailable in ancient times, and I could see thousands upon thousands of ACVs rolling west across the plains below us.

I stole a car north of the city and drove to Atlanta, where they treated me with nanite and settled me in the city.

Refugees in Celtia are treated well, even refugees from Celtic wars. My sister found me two years later. She brought me word of the Japanese Resistance Front. I heard it in silence and hoped to contribute, but what help could I be?


	24. Whether They Saw It Coming, episode 12, part 4, "River Takachiho: Chaco Canyon," Thrymsen 6, 2027

The fact was that the Celts were fucking maniacs. I was twelve in seventy-three when Japan rolled over us. We were all dead certain we'd be nuked too, right up until the empress negotiated that peace treaty with the Celts. It wasn't as though we wanted to be Japanese citizens. We just wanted to be nuked less. We knew that if Celtia "liberated" Chaco Canyon from Japan by force, the fighting that had preceded our abrupt change of national affiliation would probably look like a pleasant evening by comparison.

There was no resistance movement in Chaco Canyon. If we gave Celtia a reason to liberate us, we were convinced it would end with our deaths in nuclear fire.

Nobody begrudged us that cooperation. There were no flyers dropped on us encouraging us to resist, no big email campaigns to form an underground Native American movement. Nobody asked us to petition the empress to release us or ask the Mansa to take us back. If we rocked the boat, we were afraid it would be burned from orbit.

When we got word about what had happened in Nuremberg, every last one of us was terrified. We knew the pattern. Everyone did. If you bearded the lion in his den, he would size you up, get into position, and destroy you without mercy or remorse. 

We worried, from twenty-twelve until the war began in fifteen, that we would be the first target, the place hit the hardest. We worried that we might be the last example of what nuclear weapons can do to a defenseless populace. 

In the coin-toss that life gave us, we won.

The Celts had cooperated with the Mansa, sent a titanic force from the Sino-Grecian Territories in the north, and hit the Japanese army defending Chaco Canyon like a hammerblow. It was the first move in the war proper, and Dido XVII had given Chaco Canyon up as lost. She put up a fight to slow the Celts down, but she let them take us, figuring that we would be their problem.

I saw the strategic analyses. Japan was hoping we would burn Celtic resources resisting them, but the Celts were friends of the Mansa. They gave us back to Native America. Started the liberation process the instant the Japanese defenders surrendered. We didn't take up resources, and the Celtic army moved right along towards Tokyo, dragging their box of mysteries behind them. We didn't know what was going to come out of the box they had on a trailer behind their biggest truck, but it was an object of some speculation. None of us got it right. I kinda wished we had. Most of those alternatives were less horrific. 

We had the luxury of watching the war from the sidelines. That insane attack on Osaka was all anyone wanted to talk about after the nanites in Tokyo had been talked to death. So many thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of troops, descending on this one city. The whole world watched in horror while the Celts proved they weren't relying on nukes anymore. They'd smashed Satsuma because it sped them up, not because they needed to.

And given the way things were going on their continent, that need for speed was probably premeditated to help them on the home front. Germany and England had always contended with each other across Celtia, but the Celtic Federation had finally been betrayed by their open borders when the Germans took Coventry from England in a lightning surprise attack in 2000. 

The Celtic military was bought more than it was built, and their true strength was their absolute domination of the world financial market. It had always appeared as though they were a purely military juggernaut, but Japanese and Native American education alike placed great importance on understanding the Celts. Japan believed the Celts were their most menacing enemy. Native America believed the Celts were their ultimate saviors, like that Reptilia monster they made so many movies about, treated with caution and fear, but ultimately an ally if not provoked.

The kicker was that closing their borders with England or Germany would slow their economy way the hell down. Their only way to stop from being trapped between two warring powers was to simultaneously offend both while crippling their own economy. Ancient treaties about a hundred times renewed backed up the free passage of military forces through all three lands. Because the three had worked together against Carthage, it was unthinkable for Celtia to cease acting as the glue between the feuding neighbors. 

We knew, or suspected, that the Celts would be forced to take a side in affairs on their home continent.

The assault on Osaka didn't surprise us. It was as fast as they could go. The taking of Kyoto by a full army of Celtic special forces caught up with most of the leadership in the sweltering Harcht of 2016, and the world was already talking about the next war. England had been rattling their sabers at Germany since the Celtic army left base to menace Japan and Siam. We didn't know exactly what was going to happen next. We just knew the Celts would find a way to come out on top, and we figured it would happen soon.

We just didn't think it would be Russia that moved. That's why the whole thing was such an unmitigated disaster for the Celts.


	25. The Tokyo Letter, Published On Several Major Newsblogs, Luden 5, 2016

To the people of Celtia, to President Andres, to the Celtic Army,

Most of you do not know the sin you have committed. I have seen the horror on the faces of my fellow soldiers as we bore silent witness to the crime of Celtia. I am a soldier in the Tokyo Detachment, sent from Chaco Canyon to escort the Cloud. I have watched it loom on the horizon. I have seen the way it performs in combat, against those unsparked androids and similar test subjects.

But I have never seen it beaten.

It was our cargo, two trucks, a hundred soldiers, twenty ACVs. We didn't have enough to weather an attack, much less take a city. That was fine. We deployed fifty miles outside of Tokyo.

Deploying is a tricky process, because the Cloud is most sensitive when it's first activated. If we screwed it up, our colonel was convinced we would be its first victims as the Cloud consumed the world. I have my doubts, but it's not for the rank and file to wonder such things.

I watched as the Cloud escaped its box on the back of the truck. It flowed like smoke into the air, thick and gritty and grey, flickering here and there with the glitter of reflected light until it blocked out the diffuse sunlight coming from above. 

We were in the shadow of the smoke plume from Satsuma, and the light was feeble to begin with, but now we were in a fog that swirled around us. I could feel the tiny machines checking to see that I was really who my RFID tags said I was. I could hear the buzzing of the Cloud in the distance as its networked AI reported to our colonel, and then it dropped to the ground, the fogbank flattening out and the Cloud moving like a shallow silver sandstorm across the hills.

When it reached Tokyo, we watched it balloon upwards. Soon, it was just a diffuse greyness over the city, like shimmering smog. A couple of jet fighters crashed into the streets below, and finally, the Cloud flashed reflected light at us twice. We marched. A hundred soldiers, and we were taking a city defended by bunkers and walls and enough men and women to stop an army ten times our size without really sweating over it.

War is about killing. I accepted that when I signed up. I knew that I was a citizen of the only country on earth that has spent the majority of its free funds, historically, on buying the means to kill from others. I knew that I was part of a machine meant to destroy lives.

But it is very different to stand under the greasy black tail of smoke from a city three hundred miles away and watch a cloud of death settle on your enemy than it is to shoot another human being.

I fought in the battle of Chaco Canyon. I killed, with the guns on my ACV and with the gun I wear at my side, and I am no stranger to violence.

War is about killing, but which of the people who died in the attack on Satsuma had a chance to do anything about it? No one fought the Cloud. No one could fight it. It was as though we had poisoned everyone in uniform. The thought of a surgical strike becomes more frightening when you realize the strike requires no manpower, no guns or bullets. The Cloud can receive commands many ways. Its orders were to seek and destroy members of the Japanese armed forces and police. It was told to order civilians to remain indoors on threat of death until the order was countermanded. We shipped in a new police force. We let the local governors remain in place because they could not stop us.

Our colonel did not order an attack. He wished for the air around them to kill his enemies, and it happened. 

The Cloud prevents rebellion as well. It knows us all. A man dropped dead as he tried to punch me once. I saw an old woman fall dead in the middle of arguing with my square, and when we investigated, her hand was in her purse, wrapped around a tube of ointment, but touching a pocket knife that couldn't have harmed us because we were all in full battle gear.

To wish your enemies dead and their cities secured is understandable, but to do so knowing it will happen without their ever facing their killer, as though every citizen was stalked by their own personal sniper, that is murder, and I have committed it in _en masse._

Today, our victory over Japan is complete. Kyoto is conquered, their military gone or surrendered, their government destroyed. Today, I, and many others, resign from the army.

You have your ultimate weapon, but if you use it, you do not defeat your enemy. You murder him, and all the innocents who loved him enough to wish you dead in return.

In shame and horror,  
The Tokyo Twenty.


	26. Textual Analysis of The Russian Accord, From "A Hundred Language Lessons For Literary Learners," 2061 Edition, Hastings Educational Printers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is actually the first entry I've made that would actually be in English in-universe. Most of this fic would be more accurate in Gaelic, Latin, Greek, Cambodian, Mandarin, Arabic, Punic, or any Native American language.

Let's take a look at an important historical document. This time, we'll look at a treaty. We'll read the whole thing first, then you'll answer some questions. Watch the hologram above your page, and read aloud.

+----+

Be it then declared that on this, the seventh day of Ven, 2017, the Grand Republic of Russia shall be allied to the Volksvereinigung of Germany. 

The terms of such alliance shall be that the people of Russia may call upon the aid of Germany, and the people of Germany may call upon the aid of Russia, in matters of war, economic distress, natural disaster, and disease. 

Of particular concern shall be the matter of the Democratic Republic of England. As English aggression has been a recurring problem in the past, and the English nation possesses a greater degree of military power and a broader technological base than either signatory to this declaration can claim, it is so determined that the military power of Germany and Russia shall be engaged upon the pacification of English aggression.

Therefore, it is declared that the Russo-Germanic Alliance shall construe as an act of war any resistance on the part of the English military to their efforts at pacifying dangerous portions of the English Nation.

+----+

Use your stylus to answer the questions below. For each question, refer to the part of the hologram that is highlighted.

1\. Does this part of the text only call for a defensive alliance? If Russia declares war, does this mean that Germany can choose not to?

2\. Why does this portion of the text point out England's military superiority?

3\. Does this passage imply or state that Russia and Germany are declaring war on England? Could it be read another way?

4\. Does the end of the text attempt to avoid, justify, or provoke conflict?

5\. Analyze the Declaration as a whole. Restate its message in formal language, in casual language, and in common language. When you have finished, compare your work with the historical response to the document on the next page.

+----+

After the Russian Accord was made public, the entire world watched to see what the Celtic Cheilteach would do. The Celtic army was immediately called to the port at Osaka, while what equipment and personnel could be flown was airlifted to cities along the Celtic/German border near Coventry, where either German or English forces could be easily attacked or repelled. Defenses near Russia were tightened, and the Celtic navy escorted the remaining Japanese Invasion Force back towards Celtic waters while they began to rendezvous with reinforcements.

German and Russian soldiers began their mission of pacification by entering English territory near York and Warwick, where they were met by large detachments of the English army. 

English, Russian, and German diplomats begged the Celtic Cheilteach to join in on their side, and the Cheilteach approached each about the possibility of peace.

Because of their small size and proximity to the major Celtic city of Kalakh, as well as their historic ties to Celtia, the Russians were persuaded to accept a ceasefire on the condition that England attempted to negotiate with Germany.

Russia withdrew from combat and the Cheilteach continued to negotiate with England. 

For the second time in history, a foreign nation attempted to placate Celtia with the gift of territory, England selling Chicago to the Cheilteach in exchange for much needed raw materials. The Celtic army stationed a dreadnaught tank and its fleet of attendant tanks there, and president Andres attempted to persuade England to negotiate with Germany, but failed to have much effect on proceedings.

Germany refused to return Coventry to England, and England refused to negotiate unless what President Jones called "the show of English good faith" was returned; that is, unless England's signing over Chicago to Celtia was answered by Germany's returning Coventry to England.

Things remained in a tense equilibrium for a little over two years, from the end of 2018 to the beginning of 2021, when the English army prepared to set out from York towards Cologne. The English ambassador attempted to persuade the Cheilteach to join their assault on the Volksvereinigung, and the Cheilteach, horrified at the launching of a large surprise attack during negotiations, cut off contact with England and declared war.


	27. Testimonial On "The History Series," Vidnow.ent, Friggs 31, 2031

Of course I was there! I was stationed at Warwick when it fell, ran for Canterbury, bypassed it, and fought in the Defense Of London.

Oh, but what a time we had before then!

Now, if you want to be technical about it, the Celts declared war on us, not the other way around. We all know they had about zero choice, and only a short while to get into position, but the prime minister, that idiot Charleston, she at least listened to her military advisors. Japan, China, Holy Rome, and even Arabia had all been felled by that awful mistake of trying to dig in and weather a Celtic assault. It's not as though Celtia always had the largest army or the best tactics. It was that they were consistently better equipped and had a military tradition like you wouldn't believe. 

Half the Celtic army was raw recruits running new equipment, but they had a core contingent of veterans trained by veterans going back thousands of years. There was a whole army of fresh meat, and another whole army's worth of elite forces. No one had ever messed with the Bibracte Guard and lived. No one had ever even reached Baghdad.

But we were due south of Celtia's core territory. Can you imagine a juicer military target? Only problem was, we were dead certain they'd hit us from the north. It was the sensible move. We could invade to the north, they could head south and hit us. A good old fashioned land war.

I watched the Najran Force set out from Warwick. We expected them to hit heavy resistance right away. They did, but it was something they could overcome, a sortie from Shangi. They rolled through the Coventry Province and eventually made it all the way into Celtic territory. They were on the plains in front of the Hill Of Najran when the Celts hit them with a nanite swarm. It was barely enough. 

It happened again a month later, and yeah, so we hadn't done much major damage, but we were actually _invading Celtia._ the last people to really do that were the Carthaginians! You can talk about Atlanta and Boston in eighty-eight, but that was more of a temporary Celtic oversight. It didn't even slow them down. Any invasion that gets beaten by a thousand soldiers who just spent a week in boxcars and old jalopies wasn't really an invasion to begin with; it was more like a particularly rude wave of tourists.

We, on the other hand, were attacking Celtic towns and hurting their infrastructure. 

I started to wonder around the middle of Luden why we weren't getting our asses kicked up between our ears by a huge Celtic army. We expected to hold the line, and here we were penetrating deep into Celtic territory.

I got my answer Harcht second, when they hit Cuman.

Nobody was ever supposed to hit Cuman. It was awful strategy for a straight invasion. The place was exactly the right combination of fortified and inconvenient to really screw over invaders. Going clear to the southern tip of the continent made especially little sense for the Celts, except that they had made some deals we weren't totally aware of since Japan.

They hadn't been idle. What hit us to protect Najran and Basra wasn't the original home defense army of Celtia. It was what they bought from Native America and Rome while they sent everything after Cuman except for a fusion carrier full of scramjet fighters and Nova bombers and more nanites than we knew what to do about.

One of the nanite swarms followed up their fighter attacks on Hastings by rolling in and holding the city. Our boys actually managed to kill the first one, but the second overwhelmed them, and then...

What happened to Cuman is almost suspiciously similar to what happened to Prague. Hell, they even opened up with an assault by the 132nd Amphibious Army. That unit softened up the defenses, retreated, and then they swamped our boys with more numbers than they could deal with. Cuman was proof against most invaders, but more than half of the entire Celtic military was about ten times what they could stop.

So we started looking for weaknesses. Probably the most tempting target was Camulodunum, north of York. That was the very southern edge of Ancient Celtia, the real heart of the Federation. It was also vastly underdefended. There was a a pair of ancient traditional military garrisons there, and while between that and the Great Wall of Vienne, it would have been a hard fight, England had the ability to win it twenty times over.

Around the time I left for London from North Canterbury Station, we got word that York had fallen to a nanite attack. The strike force headed for Camulodunum was hit by a scramjet assault while they were turning to retake York, and they never made it through the nanites.

After that, it was all over. If they'd sent us up after Camulodunum from the start, things might have been different. We could have taken everything from Kufah to Carthage, and the Celts were in the wrong position to stop us. It might not have won the war, but it would have changed it a hell of a lot.


	28. Personal Logs of Admiral Geoffrey Berns, Del 2021-Horus 2022

Wodensday, Del 12th, 2021

Arrived off the Port of Canterbury this morning at 0732. The gunners insist the English are concentrated here more even than they were at Cuman. If we are to continue finding resistance this heavy, more soldiers and materiel will have to come from the north. I regret terribly that I cannot do more than to bombard the city. If I could attack each individual enemy with my guns, I would. As it is, I must watch the army dash itself against the rocks of England's defenses. 

Every day, we receive word of another narrow victory at the border, and I wonder if crippling England's industrial centers is worth the loss of life on Celtic soil. It is only in our victories that I can exult, but these come rarely and slow. I have no expectation that the English can win this war, but it is only in the last thirty years that any enemy has successfully invaded their lands.

Coventry is an example, but I do not know if it is an example we should hold up.

+----+

Friggday, Del 30, 2021

The army attacked Canterbury at noon, half an hour after the guns fell silent. I command a quiet fleet, watching the skies for a counterattack while the scramjets swirl overhead. The captain of the destroyer _Prescience_ claims that his lidar team is seeing signs of stealthed traffic in the area. If so, I fear English destroyers are stalking us. If we have miscalculated, if the English navy needs only to gather in force in order to destroy us, it may be that I am in command of a great futility. 

Celtia has not increased the size of her navy in decades. The technology has kept pace with developments. Old equipment has been retired when necessary, but it would take little guesswork to know precisely what is needed to drown us with numbers.

+----+

Ibisday, Ven 17, 2021

The cruiser detachment has reached past London and Vienne, and has sighted the English battleships _Potemkin_ and _Gilgamesh_ near the Isthmus of Bagacum. The distance is great, but I have ordered the assault. Two of our fusion cruisers are more than a match for two of their most advanced battleships.

They are ordered to employ full stealth measures, but as they are not destroyers, they can only conceal their approach so well.

+----+

Wodensday, Ven 18, 2021

Disaster! _Resolute_ is sunk in combat, and _Potemkin_ has escaped! The English ships were setting an ambush, and a stealthed submarine struck the fatal blow.

 _Chey_ was able to sink the submarine, but there is little we can do to chase our remaining quarry. 

The great shipyard at Utica has deployed a brand new battleship to patrol our waters, but even the many ships being built to destroy the English navy may prove unequal to the terrible burden of chasing down a few dozen ships in the world's vast ocean.

We have taken a large contingent of the army back onto the transports and headed for London. Newcastle is secured, after some months of fighting, and Canterbury fell this morning before reveille, so we will soon have purpose again.

+----+

Rasday, Horus 8, 2022

The guns thunder and my ears ring all the time. London has weathered us for six months and we are forlorn, but at last the transports are off.

The destroyers have done their grisly work, and twice, we've heard the distant, muffled reports of mines damaging or destroying English submarines. There is nothing left to do but to watch and wait while the army attacks from the west and our transports strike from the sea.

I have no doubt that London will be ours, and the whole of the English countryside will be under Celtic control, but that will never end this war. We have stirred a nest of hornets against ourselves, and they will persist in stinging us until we have swatted them all or the beasts have killed us. Heather Charleston rejected the offer of mercy for capitulation, and her rejection was delivered from the sea. The English mean to fight us from the ocean. They mean to have back their cities and their farms, to build roads once more where Celtic jumplanes are already being laid.

In a way, I admire them. But no force in the world will outshine the brilliance of Celtic conquest.


	29. Final Log Entry, English Destroyer Stalker, Baldersmon 2027, Sent As Email to Justinian V, President and Supreme Leader of Siam

Freyaday, Baldersmon 22, 2027

They have caught us! They have caught us and all is lost!

I will here attempt to justify all that has happened since the war began. Let this record stand as testimony to Celtic aggression. Let them be excoriated in history, by the people of the future. Let us be proof positive of Celtic ill-intent.

I have, for five years, led my people from the bridge of the Stealth Destroyer _Stalker,_ where I have conducted a war against the Celts. After their fleet took London, there was no place on land that the English government could call its own, and many of my people have accepted Celtic rule.

I will be plain: this is treason. English governors sit in their appointed places and call themselves Celts, English citizens have laid down the instruments of rebellion in exchange for security. It is treason, and if I had taken back my lands, it would have been punished.

Not that the citizenry would have been punished unmercifully. Only those who promoted the cause of surrender would be destroyed.

It has been my cause, these five years, to thwart Celtic development. Their constructor ships, off the coast of Basra, have been building a jumplane to let their navy cross the oceans more quickly. Elsewhere, an intercontinental tunnel is being laid that will ultimately permit them to move freely without a navy anywhere but in protection of the road beneath the waves. Neither of these efforts could be allowed to succeed, but in stopping them, I fear I have become predictable.

Countless times, we have assaulted the construction efforts, but this time, one of their fusion destroyers was lying in wait.

The Celtic lidar systems have detected us. Their railgun cannon has already holed us once, and they are closing in for the kill.

The progress I have made will not be in vain. Our coalition will one day unite and destroy Celtia. From Germany to Siam, from Rome to Russia, the true enemies of Celtia will rise. Though I stand on the brink of execution, though I am bereft of hope for myself, I order the guns fired until the last.

This is the last ship of England. All others have been lost.

 _Potemkin, Gilgamesh, Trafalgar, Dreadnaught, Dauntless, Heroic, Justice, Britannia, Albion, Farragut, Wanderer, Churchill, Relentless, Valiant, Lusitania, Selassie, Royale, Kismet, White Star,_ we remember your loss. We honor each of the 20,206 Celtic lives you took, and we mourn the loss of all 41,882 of you. It is for your sacrifice and honor that I order the guns fired. It is for your bravery and heroism that I resist to the last,that my example may be followed.

To the world at large, I say fight on, and I pray that you unite against Celtia before it's too late. I do not pray to Thor or Freya, I do not beg Ra or Hathor, but I pray instead to the god who last saw a Celtic defeat. I beg that Jesus may see you do to Celtia what the Celts so long ago did to his precious Carthage.

Go forth in the spirit of victory.

Heather Charleston, Prime Minister, England


	30. Letter Found Unsent in His Rooms On Getshwayo's Death, Shainuary 20, 2029

Shainuary 17, 2029

My Dearest, Brenna,

I have seen the launch of the _China,_ and her magnificent drive has already sent her out of the narrow confines of our solar system.

Oh, but that I could go with her! I am trapped here, on Geosynch Station. The many people I see here are all my countrymen, for there are no countries here. A matter of law has come to my attention, and I have sent the question of orbital fighters and bombers along to your president. But to you, my love, I have only the news of my glorious vision of the future. 

Since you joined me for that rapturous time two years ago, it has been strange to be alone. If only you could have stayed. If only we could have been together on Earth, but it was not to be. We might have united our people through a state marriage a thousand years ago, but we were forced to be at arm's length until neither of us was more than a historical footnote. If we had let our affair be public while we had power...

It does not bear thinking about and it is not why I write to you now. I write to tell you of the Drive.

My darling, it has worked! To see the _China_ vanish was perhaps my proudest moment. Fast as they are, I expect to die before their first messages reach us from their destination. We have done a tremendous thing, and there is to be no mistake about it. To think of another world, with its own history, born of ours. I am overjoyed that I, or anyone, might have the chance to be a part of history even in the stars!

We have ensured mankind's survival! We are all, now, eternal in some way.

Goodnight, my love, from one Immortal to another,  
Getshwayo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am still doing this, slowly.


	31. Tolosa University Students Destroy Industry, Economy "Relatively Stable" (cen.digitwave.agg, Shonx 8, 2035)

An industry died today. At 2:06 AM, Tolosa time, a block of silicon weighing in at half a ton was sliced into over ten thousand pieces and entirely consumed by a nanite swarm. The swarm is currently actively providing internet service to the surrounding half mile, completely free of charge. 

The swarm, which is the brainchild of student Devin Moorecock, is expected to expand to cover nearly a thousand square miles and maintain itself without human intervention for the next thirty years, at which point it will ask local officials for raw materials with what Moorecock described as "a polite email."

Moorecock, an English-born senior, says their goal was explicitly to destroy the Internet Service Provider industry.

"These are large companies that accumulate huge sums of money in order to bribe politicians into letting them abuse their customers so they can accrue even more money. Ever since AWRA, they employ about four people in any given province and pay them minimum wage," Moorecock said to reporters at Tolosa University's press conference, referring to the Artifical Worker's Rights Act passed last year. The act, which made explicit the rights of certain industries to employ sophisticated distributed intelligences in the place of as many workers as the AI was able and willing to do the work of. The practice, which began at the dawn of practical robotics, became much more cost-effective with the advent of Strong AI in 2015. At the time, an AI could reasonably do the work of a dozen people, and the question of how much pay an AI was due became critically important in legislative circles.

Advancements in electronics and micronics since have vastly increased the efficiency of AI workers, who have nearly unlimited capacity to replace humans in some roles. The AWRA controversially granted these workers the right to negotiate their salaries by offering to replace up to nineteen thousand workers. This decision matched exactly with the conclusions of a 2031 study that said the most profitable number of people to allow AI workers to replace for telecom companies would be between fifteen and twenty thousand, a number which would force intense competition for wages and perks among a population of intelligences much larger than the number of available jobs.

The AWRA has been attacked as being effectively written by service providers, who have profited enormously without benefiting either the human or the AI community with greater pay or reduced service rates, with the cost of internet service largely decoupled from the cost of labor to provide it.

"I created an intelligence that is willing to provide internet service in exchange for being distributed across the earth. As a distributed intelligence, it will be able to interconnect all of us, but its goal is simply to observe and experience humanity. Essentially, it exists to be the internet. There are those who say this is an act of extreme foolishness, but areas of strategic or governmental importance have been nanite shielded for fifteen years. The seed of this AI has been passed to public domain, along with the design of the nanites that support it, and they are free to download from my Raket account. As of right now, my projections indicate nearly a tenth of the world has free internet."

Although Moorecock's prediction was optimistic, it has since been exceeded and several telecommunications companies have declared bankruptcy as their industry ceases to exist. Economists agree that the boost of sudden removal of the costs associated with supporting the industry will almost entirely absorb the cost of the industry's collapse, a side benefit of telecom efforts to minimize the amount of money they were putting back into the economy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In 2035, I got a random event in thr form of a sizable culture boost from Tolosa University. It was pretty satisfying.


	32. From the Berlin Interviews, Released Shainuary 5, 2041

I think the main question everyone had was "when did this become an issue?" After all, none of us really gave it much thought until Gustav Kant showed up. But that was what Berlin was like, right? It was like if Baghdad and Bibracte got really drunk and had a baby, only everyone spoke German all the time. But suddenly Herr Gustav is on the capital steps shouting about secession and joining the Celtic Federation, and it goes from people laughing about how Germany is basically North Celtia to a serious discussion.

Here was the thing, though: Coventry. After the war with England, Coventry was an island of Germany in a sea of Celtia. After the Russian Accord, international relations were more than a little chilly, and when the Celts asked the president to liberate Coventry into Celtic hands in '31, Congress drove a hard bargain. Eventually, it happened, but we were all a little surprised at how much they asked for in return. Initially, people tried to say they wanted Mecca, or Tolosa, or Kufah. That was ridiculous, but it was the kind of ridiculous that made you think, because no one in the world would voluntarily give up being a Celtic citizen. You could transfer Tolosa yo German hands all you want, but it won't consider itself German. Coventry, London, Kyoto, Prague? All Celtic now, and they were all happy and healthy.

It was a groundswell, and there was Congress and the President staring down the Celts like it was _their_ fault. Five tense months.

I don't think the English War had really ended. If you look at the shape of history, the Celts had maintained their position on the world stage by wrangling the feuding brothers that were England and Germany while Russia supported Celtia in the background. Celtic prominence and power were a product of stability in the heart of their territory and staunch allies. The war with England had bloodied the Celtic nose, killed Celtic soldiers and ended in invasions of celtic soil and deaths of Celtic sailors and merchant shipping crews. Najran had been menaced by English armies, Vienne, the city famous for never seeing war up close, had been struck by a raid, and the Celtic people were furious.

I think it would have happened to Russia if it wasn't for Herr Gustav. But he kicked things off. He attacked Congress, cut off the president's escape route, and claimed Berlin for the secession. Most of us didn't object. The ones who did quickly found out that Gustav Kant commanded a very real military force, and he wasn't about to let people oppose it without answering them in force.

The remaining German government blamed the Celts for the massacre and mobilized to cut off Celtic forces coming to pacify German riots. The whole country had gone up like a powderkeg, and they were trying to destroy the people coming to help. Essen and Frankfurt sent troops to fight, and the whole government collapsed everywhere but on the islands. Essen and Frankfurt called it a naked grab for power, Baghdad practically screamed that they were only trying to help, and a pathetically small resistance failed to stop Celtia from saving all of our asses. Next thing we knew, there were arcologies and new schools and foreign aid, only it wasn't really _foreign_ if the German government was gone. We had Essen and Frankfurt, but they were just madmen screaming about destroying Celtia and consumed by riots. That was no government, and we watched from the sidelines as the Celtic navy made its last great deployment. Without Germany, there was no chance anyone could or would argue with Celtia. It was over. The world was conquered. The other countries just had to realize it first.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> what happened here is going to take some explaining, but for now I'll just let the story unfold. All you need to know right now is that Germany declared war on me and they were in no way prepared for that fight, but neither was I, so it was a piecemeal clusterfuck.


	33. Popular Thread from cen.blogin.skg, c. Spring 2043

KhittyKhrap35

I don't really c the problem with annexation. It's lyke, if the Celts want to tayk over Bangkok, that just sounds lyke more food for me bcuz thay havv those | farms.

biggolsawsige

I'll tell you exactly what the problem is with annexation, Khitty. You're obvs in Siam, which means you never even heard about the rough side of Celtic expansion. You still have Justinianists running around Phoenicia and Pattaya. All the scary you know comes from living in an old, established police state where you're oppressed but there's not fighting in the streets. I'm from Frankfurt, but I live in Essen because I COULDN'T get back home after the war.

My dad was in the Frankfurt Defense Militia. He was in the south division. We used to see the Celtic blockades up close. After they locked down the mainland, with Cologne running them around for a few months to buy us time, a load of their destroyers started patrolling by us all the time. They shelled us from the water and we listened to the barracks getting blown to hell. We were wondering why they didn't just Cloud us. It was traumatizing as hell. They took three months to land, and they did it behind a swarm of bombers.

Celtic suborbital bombers do not fuck around, by the way. They make this awful noise like a gun going off next to your ear, and then something blows up. I know they were aiming to minimize civilian casualties, but it's a fucking suborbital bomber. They launch it like a ballistic missile and some dumbfuck has to point all those weapons at the target while she's screaming out of space at 8000 meters a second. She gets ten seconds to fire off thirty little rockets, and I know they're good, but they're not perfect. They're better at not hitting innocents than an icbm is, but I lost five friends to Celtic bombs, and all on different days. 

They hit the farmsteads on the south end of the island with their invasion, spread out over my dad's position, and headed north. I was on the third-to-last boat out of the harbor. The Celts rolled into town behind us, and we had to watch them going after the people who stayed. I knew exactly what they were doing there, ident tagging everyone so their computers could keep track for them. I figured it would happen to me, too, since they'd hit Essen eventually. 

But we got there three weeks behind the Cloud. That was why they didn't Cloud Frankfurt. They were using the Cloud to control Essen so they could trick us into coming there. They didn't want a naval resistance like with England. 

The Celts are cold and calculating and they WILL move to ensure they stamp out ANY resistance. If they annex Siam, you will be important to them only in that civilian deaths are bad pr. No amount of food is going to make that okay.

herstorian

Khmer Empire: hey, fuck the Celts

*gets fucked up*

America: hey, the Celts are fucking violent!

*gets fucked up*

Greece: hey, leave America alone!

*gets fucked up*

China: whoa, hey, they fucked us up, too!

*gets fucked up super hard*

Holy Rome: hey, let's not give them more power and land

*gets fucked up*

Japan: hey, give land to the people who own it!

*gets fucked up*

England: *just minding our own business*

*gets fucked up*

Germany: hey, stop stealing our cities!

*gets fucked up*

Siam: hey, come steal our cities!


	34. Berlin Micronics Board Implicated In War Crimes, Roman Forum, Shonx 7, 2043

The tech prodigy that made internet universal and free has deep ties to the agitators that started the German Annexation War. The war, which killed nearly three hundred thousand people, was believed to be the exclusive work of Gustav Kant until the unexpected revelation of a secret benefactor who provided much of the money and information Kant used to strike at the old German Congress. A shocking twist in the story yesterday implies that Devin Moorecock, while establishing Berlin Micronics, may have funneled funds and intelligence to the revolutionary.

The former TU student, fresh from the technoculture breakthrough that eliminated internet unavailability and destroyed the overreaching power of the Internet Service Provider industry, went to Berlin and started a company intended to use his methods for German utilities and infrastructure, but new findings indicate he also funded the Berlin Defectors Army. 

The investigation into the campaign contributions last year by Berlin Micronics to AI-Rights advocate Juliana Shu's bid for governor of the Japanese Province turned up a shocking chain of communiques to and from Herr Gustav, the leader of the notorious BDA. 

In the messages, which span the entire summer of 2037 from Harcht 12 until the fall of Munich, the Berlin Micronics executive board directs Gustav, who would soon earn the moniker of Metzger der Straßen for his rampage on the eve of Baldersmon 2037, on how best to elude German police and where to set up so that the Celtic Army could take over their positions.

While it is commonly accepted that the BDA must have had a Celtic military advisor passing them information, this is the first evidence of that unknown party's method for speaking to their German allies. How many members of the executive board were actually involved with the BDA remains unclear, as does the precise role of Moorecock, but it is almost certain they were all aware of their beneficiary's identity.

While criminal charges have not been filed, this may be because the precise nature of the crime commited, and whether, legally, there was actually a crime, is unclear. 

Depending on the degree of involvement, it is conceivable that members of the Berlin Micronics board could be construed as having conducted a false flag operation, a military tactic banned by international treaty. A false flag operation, which is considered a war crime under the 1975 Pak Kret Accord, is a military mission which one group attempts to imitate another in order to deceive their enemies. While such missions are permitted for the purpose of escaping from combat and moving undetected, it is a serious war crime to attack while under the false flag. 

If members of the Berlin Micronics board are found to have played what UN officials call an "active and perfidious role" in the BDA's attack, they will be charged, but it is uncertain that such charges would stick to a civilian. 

"None of these people seem to be government employees, let alone military personnel," warns Antonius Hadrian, UN Legal Attache to Rome. "They may be considered within their rights to have taken an active role in the political process of Germany, despite the extralegal results of their actions. It is not, strictly speaking, internationally illegal to aid violent revolutions, and Celtic law specifically protects citizens of annexed states from the legal complications that arise from political activism before the Celtic conquest."

The problem in this case is both the scope and the impact of the company's actions. Historians and policy experts agree that the rise of Gustav Kant's BDA was highly unusual; the German populace was largely uninterested in secession or annexation. Only three referenda related to the subject had been circulated in the last thirty years, all of them before legislative bodies no higher than city councils. Two of these were rejected, and the third vetoed by popular vote. If the movement owes its existence to interference by Berlin Micronics, the international community is likely to demand some sort of punishment for those involved. The unprecedented scale of the alleged crime, however, means that it may be necessary to create a new section of international criminal law to charge them.

If they are charged and tried, however, it remains to be seen if the punitive measures demanded by the international community will be enforced. Several analysts have pointed to previous Celtic reluctance to allow Celtic nationals to face consequences for international crimes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, what actually happened here is that I was playing with espionage. It had been long enough since I'd played the RoM mod that I straight up forgot what the "bribe city" button did. I hit it, and was suddenly at war with Germany and had to defend my brand new city of Berlin. 
> 
> Not my greatest gaming moment.


	35. The Speech From The Farmscraper, Shainuary 8, 2043

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, in the very beginning of 2043, I got a supervolcano disaster that did the same thing as the asteroid strike. I hadn't improved food infrastructure enough to prevent a population collapse, but I did have the tech to reverse it. I started building high-powered food buildings as fast as possible and they were enough to more than replace the loss. I didn't immediately help Russia, but as soon as they reminded me of their existence, I gave them the entire tech tree because even in the hilariously unlikely event that they went to war with me (they've loved me since I first made contact with them. They have spent more time as my vassal than any other civ I have encountered), they were too small to outmatch my outsized military. Really, everyone was at this point, even taken together.

It is only with despair that we can look upon the devestation of our countrymen in this trying time. The earth has once more reminded us that we are tolerated, not supported. I have seen the reports out of Kalakh. It is not the expected site of a supervolcano. We knew it was there, but it did not draw the attention of the public in the same way as Gaul or Prosperity Point, which were beautiful and active and dangerous to be in. Kalakh Hills was buried under an inland sea, shallow and alkaline, a known factor and almost calm. 

My friends, I have moved. The presidential palace shall not be occupied until every Celt and every human being has food to eat and security in their home.

Baghdad will be an example to the world. I will see to it that the resources of this Federation will be devoted to halting the crisis. We cannot bring back the sun. We cannot simply move to space. This world is our home and we will survive on it. I have ordered a crash construction of farmscrapers and arcologies. Across the planet, economic gears are turning to establish these institutions, often at the cost of luxuries or to the exclusion of other, vastly important projects. I will not lie. We are facing a famine. More than a century ago, an asteroid strike shook us all, and although we recovered, we did not prepare for the possibility that our world might again be choked with ash and dust. But this time, we have the power to save billions. There will be death. In the months, the years to come, many will starve. But I promise you all, Celts and citizens of Earth, there will be food in time. 

I have already given over the technology to save themselves to the people of Russia, and Celtic technicians are helping them to design their own farmscrapers. Native America, Rome, and Siam are being contacted as I speak. 

I will tell you all that as I administrate from here in the Baghdad farmscraper, I will be giving serious consideration to the matter of Siam. Justinian V, their President, remains defiant and set against us even in this crisis. Without a guarantee of military security, we cannot offer Siam the techniques it will take to maintain their own farmscrapers, arcologies, and other lifesaving installations. Rest assured, I _will_ protect and feed the people of Siam. We are all in this together. Let us be as one people in the face of this crisis.


	36. Forward to The Last Resistors, by Joanna Hensche, Bagacum Books, 2188

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd already started building up an army on Siam's border. It had been there since the Japanese war when I left a contingent to chase down any attackers on the off chance Siam was dumb enough to try something. The supervolcano actually happened just as I was preparing to attack. I was initially going to take a lot longer to set up perfectly, but I decided to attack while Justinian was relatively off balance from the sudden population crash.
> 
> I mean, the whole thing lasted two turns and then the naval remnant of Siam was forced into peace by a random event. I didn't need to seize the opportunity, and the next couple of chapters will point that out. At this point, I was actually literally able to conduct an entire war in one turn. It was... One hell of an experience.

It is difficult, from the perspective of a century after the fact, to be certain of Celtic motives in 2043. Certainly the technology given to Russia upon the dawning of the crisis was not to be construed as a power-player's move. And handing the power to create nanite clouds to Siam was out of the question in the face of the long historical animosity between the two nations. 

Siam has been described as the middle child of the Grecian empire's fragments. Its history is one of long grudges and steady erosion. Confined to the Eastern Polar Coast by an ancient war with Holy Rome, only Pak Kret, Bangkok, and Pattaya commanded significant resources, and these largely for reasons of geography. Pak Kret was a gift to Siam during the Holy Roman War, a bribe to keep Siamese forces out of the fight, Siamese before the Great Contact, Holy Roman for centuries after it and Nonthaburi fell to Holy Roman swords. The ancient conquest was seen as an old grudge and point of honor in Siam, but the citizens of Pak Kret were as much Holy Roman as the citizens of Mecca were Celtic. Nonthaburi had never become Siamese again, and in fact, most citizens had no idea the name was even Siamese.

Siam had spent so long downtrodden and broken because of their old disputes with Holy Rome, and it was only a sharp xenophobia and zealous isolationism that preserved them from being fragmented beyond repair. Siamese diplomacy was pugnacious and blunt, and international relations were traditionally warmest with the other Mandarinic nations, but Japan and China were gone; Japan a part of Celtia and the last of China on a spaceship, heading to another planet. All they had left was a conglomerate of nations that had, at one time or another, been at war or on the brink of it with them. 

The Celtic refusal to transfer technology to the Justinianist government of Siam was not entirely unreasonable. There was no way to give the required expertise to prevent famine without teaching the Siamese industrial base the underlying principles of nanite production. With the power to save their communities, Siam would also gain the power to create a nanite swarm. Such an eventuality would, quite possibly, doom all of the northern Greek continent to conquest by a Siamese invasion that worked on the same astonishingly deadly level as Celtic forces. Siam had little to lose from such an assault, provided they could strategize well enough to hold their winnings. At best, such a scenario would result in a lengthy war and thousands upon thousands of deaths simply to keep Siam contained.

Native America and Rome disagreed with the assessment to a certain extent, and believed it was best to simply give the knowledge to Siam and prevent the building of nanotechnology with sanctions. In fact, each had promised to share freely with Siam if they got their hands on anything that could prevent mass starvation. Effectively, the Celtic and Russian risk assessment stalled the whole process.

President Aine Al-Rashid of Celtia solved the problem very quickly. In the ash-choked summer of 2043, she annexed all of Siam and announced the dissolution of its government. On Shonx 12th, she called for the surrender of their military and the removal of all government officials in favor of Celtic governorship. There was no declaration of war. She simply announced that Siam no longer existed and was now part of Celtia.

Of course, now it was up to the Celts to back up their bold claim. Ever since the Japanese war, a sizable force had been parked near the Siamese border, but while sufficient to defend against any potential Siamese invasion, the army detachment there was unequal to and poorly positioned for the task of aggression. Between their smallish numbers (relative, of course, to the usual size of a Celtic invasion force), their positioning, and the fact that the looming food shortage was a clear and imminent threat, the annexation of Siam was set to be a struggle until reinforcements could arrive.

The accomplishment of the Celtic invasion force was earthshattering. In two months, moving through starvation and stiff resistance, they took first the southern trio of Siamese provinces, Pak Kret, Bangkok, and Hat Yai. Then, without pausing for so much as a chance to regroup, they charged onwards. Phoenicia and Pattaya fell to Celtic guns in the early autumn of 2043, and Celtic peacekeepers spread out to take control of the countryside. Justinian V fled in a battleship from Phoenicia before he could be captured, and although the Celtic Navy searched for him for some months, it wasn't until Shainuary 1st, 2044 that the war was over. 

On the first day of the year, a Celtic coastal patrol encountered the Siamese battleship _Kaya_ near Prague. The coastal patrol boarded the battleship, but before the battle could escalate, Justinian's men turned on him. The Celtic sailors accepted the surrender of the Siamese, who were well aware that their location had already been broadcast to Celts everywhere. Justinian was given over to Celtic hands and allowed to technically remain a head of state, but the fact was that he was a defiant prisoner and nothing more. Siam died with him some five years later. Despite the stated Celtic motive of charity and lifesaving, he maintained that the Celts only wanted to eliminate a rival. Whatever the case, there was no resisting the Celtic Federation. The overwhelming majority of the world's resources were in Celtic hands, and as the war closed out, a formal alliance between Celtia and Russia guaranteed that the only people able to form the core of a resistance would be unwilling. The remainder of the non-Celtic world could not hold out against a concerted attempt to take over. The truth of this was clear, and as the dust of war settled atop the ashes of disaster, the world waited to see if war was gone, if, having eliminated the last truly hostile state, the Celts would stop conquering and lead as they had promised.

The alliance with Russia suggested they would, but the Russian legislature had been very nearly a separate branch of the Celtic one for centuries. There was no possibility that Russia would resist Celtic rule: they were willing to end wars and change laws at the first Celtic suggestion. Native American and Roman law were independent, though frequently similar to Celtic law. 

When Aine Al-Rashid presented her terms to the Mansa and to the Roman Senate, nervous doubt turned into a quiet diplomatic terror. Every Celtic demand was reasonable. It also happened that each Celtic demand amounted to accepting the same subservient attitude as Russia. 

The price for saving billions of lives was capitulation to Celtic hegemony. What happened next was probably inevitable from the moment the Kalakh Hills Supervolcano erupted.


	37. Exhibit in the Museum of World History, Cahokia, 2188

The most hotly contested court case in history was decided on Harcht 8, 2047. The judge was Neil Brenham, an octogenarian political appointee to the International Judiciary. The office, created as a diplomatic ploy in 2019, had never decided an issue of this magnitude, but had generally been effective in adjudicating international disputes and preventing another incident like that which provoked the Japanese War. Brenham's colleague, the only genderfluid judge to sit on the IJ bench for the years of its existence, had made history by ruling that Celtia could stipulate military security as an absolute guarantee in treaties in 2043.

Judge Brenham was faced with the divisive issue of whether the governments of Rome and Native America could be dismantled for the benefit of their citizens. 

His decision remains one of the most studied pieces of Celtic legal literature in history, and is the last such decision to be submitted in handwritten notation. The dissolution of the Judiciary some five weeks later eliminated the last court in history to use hardcopy and handwriting for formal documents. It is here preserved for public viewing, on the characteristic nondegrading molymer paper of the era.

+----+

Harcht 8, 2047

There comes a time in the history of any empire when it must be determined for what end conquest may be carried out. The ancient Carthaganians fought viciously for religion. The Holy Roman State deemed profit a sufficient motive. For the people of middle-period Celtia, security or vengeance were adequate motive.

Today, I am faced with a decision that lies beyond my station. The decision I render will determine history's course from now until a future I cannot begin to imagine. 

To that end, I will not hide behind legalese. My decision will be rendered in plain language and my references and precedents will be clearly explained. 

The issue before us is the legitimacy of the Roman and Native American governments in the face of the vast benefits offered by submitting to Celtic rule. I will not pretend that these cultures and governing bodies will survive untouched by such an eventuality. The fact is that we are discussing whether governments besides the most powerful and largest have a right to exist. This court has heard arguments that claim the sovereignty of nations trumps all other concerns, and arguments that the right of humans to safety, security, and survival far outstrip the rights of governments.

There is neither a clear moral solution nor a true precedent to be followed on this matter. I refer back to the matter of Justinian V vs. The Celtic Federation, decided in the opening days of 2043. Although this matter is similar in many ways, there is a clear difference. In the matter of Siam, Siamese acquisition of nanotechnology could have endangered Celtic lives. While Celtia, which has been at times an enemy in war to nearly every nation on Earth, possesses the military power to overcome any opposing force, might does not equate to moral or legal authority. It does equate to responsibility, however. 

Therefore, the question before me is, at its core, one of the extent of responsibility and of rights. Does the onus upon Celtia, as the font of greatest power and prosperity, to preserve human life override the right of other nations to determine their own courses? I cannot argue against the decision to allow the annexation of Siam, as the survival of the people of that nation ran counter to the goals and policies of their government, and such technologies and powers as they required of the Celts were nearly guaranteed to be used, whether in open warfare or in subterfuge, against the free peoples of the world.

I cannot say the same of Rome and Native America. Although each has been an enemy to the Celtic people in the past, there is not sufficient animus to expect such abuses of power and of human rights from them. The demands for submission made by the Celtic Diplomatic Corps are unnecessary and capricious. It is the decision of this court that the Celtic Federation has the responsibility to render, without reservation, the aid that will preserve Roman and Native American lives. 

So it is ordered, on this, the eighth day of Harcht, 2047, this court orders that the Celtic army shall be turned inward to render aid to their own people, that the resources of Rome and Native America shall be increased and their people be educated, such that the current crisis shall take no more lives than it already has.

+----+

This ruling, of course, was summarily ignored, but its brutal honesty and dismissal of Celtic rule remain important.


	38. Rome Lives On, Speech by Severus Foxthwaite to The Resistance Council of Antium, Del 15, 2052

It was a quiet, temperate day in the otherwise sweltering Thrymsen of 2047 when I witnessed the fall of Rome. I was one of the lucky thousand in my district who had won the grocery permissions for the week, boosted in my efforts by the minor prestige associated with my work in climatology and environmental sciences. They needed me fed and happy in case I invented some way to clean the air and magically restore the biosphere that had been crippled by the supervolcano. The heat of that summer was an effect of the vegetation crash. Shade trees had begun dying off, and mass deforestation for raw materials and public safety meant that our only inland temperature regulator was gone. Average temperatures were way down globally, but extremes were more common because of the loss of stability.

I first realized the invasion had begun when a Celtic War Drone rolled into my front yard. I was outside, living near the city limits and actually getting to eat because I could get to the Celtic border. The ancient walls of Rome itself were about thirty miles south of me, reinforced with advanced weapons and fancy gadgets that could let them slow down a modern army. 

People get the impression a lot that Romans didn't like the Celts. That we didn't want to be invaded. A lot of my peers didn't like it. The senate, obviously, didnt want to be dissolved. I just saluted the War Drone and told it the walls of Rome were thataway. It stayed, but it turned its weapons out to protect me. A few minutes later some Celtic sergeant came up to me and told me I was an Important Asset to Be Protected. I asked if it was because I was a scientist. He laughed and told me it was because I had just become a Celtic citizen. I braced for the worst. There was about to be a huge war. There were War Drones and soldiers marching all over everywhere, but pretty soon it was down to one at every house. The sergeant told me what was happening.

It was a war. But the Celts had started mass-producing new units after England fell. London and Hastings were all military production. Clones and androids and drones and everything they could possibly need were coming along at an alarming rate. They doubled the population over the course of a few hours by parking soldiers at every house.

Yes, there was fighting. But they protected everyone that didn't fight. Celtic war had never been fought like this. They learned from Siam. They built up their forces, they didn't go off half-cocked, they just... Moved. They were there and done in a day. Nubia was taken by a nanite cloud, Antium fought hard, as did Rome, Cumae put up a token struggle, and none of it mattered except that six months later I was watching my neighbors eating and hearing the president making speeches about national unity.

The thing people forget sometimes is that Rome's rulers objected to the Celtic takeover because it would mean less power for them. In an ideal world, I would have had the freedom to agree with them, but a government's job is to protect its people. Rome couldn't do that. They couldn't even feed us. Society, they say, is always three missed meals away from collapse. Under the Celts, our society didn't collapse. It would have under the senate. There were already enormous riots. Rome was falling apart and we didn't care who was in charge as long as they fed us and kept us alive. 

And the Celts aren't tyrants. Look around you. I have rights. I have my health. There's nothing to stop me from calling myself Roman. My thoughts are free and my laws are reasonable. Treason and terrorism are crimes of violence, not of dissent, because dissent is not a crime. In old Rome, it was illegal to suggest secession to a legislative body. There is no such restriction now. Instead, quality of life and sheer economy suggest staying Celtic. I found a law in my studies that allows us to act as our own nation within Celtia. We have used it to improve our lives and laws. My taxes are higher than they used to be, but my cost of living less burdensome than ever before, so much that my taxes could be half my income and I would still have the budget to move to a new house next year. I live in absolute decadence compared to the standards I held in 2046, and even in 2040, as a wealthy child of wealthy parents, I could not have imagined this opulence.

I am considered impoverished by the Cuilteach. _Impoverished!_ They are working hard to _improve my plight,_ as though my lack of access to worldwide travel and orbital hotels is a terrible burden to me.

The Celtic Federation conquered Rome in 1994. The whole world was partying because the Celts wanted to blow off steam. Celtic culture and tradition were all we ever saw. Celtic technology made us all feel backwards. That law against talking about secession? It was passed in 1988. Between then and 2047, nearly five hundred counties, towns, and small cities on the Celtic border voted to invite in the Celtic police and quietly joined the Celtic Federation while Celtic soldiers and drones and androids defended their right to do so over the powerless objections of the senate.

Celtic culture conquered us. The military just pointed it out to the senate and defended us when it all got violent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I took all of Rome in one turn. All of it. It felt more like quashing a barbarian city before it got too powerful than taking down the highest scorer besides me. Native America went the same way, only easier. It was... Enlightening. I hadn't realized I'd grown that powerful. It made sense, though. England and Germany had both benefited enormously from our alliance before I gutted them, and England was the last war I really had to try with. Germany only took so long because I didn't prepare and I didnt have a direct route to Essen yet, so my nanite clouds took ages to get there. Rome, on the other hand, got slammed by my full military all at once, and the result was four cities mine and Rome out of military units.
> 
> It was brutal.


End file.
